East-and West-man

We went to Greenwich on Friday. Greenwich is the home of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and the Prime Meridian, or 0° longitude, which divides the Western and Eastern Hemispheres. Greenwich is also where Henry VIII and Elizabeth I were born.

To get to Greenwich, we took the Tube to the London Bridge station, and then the National Rail going East, two stops to Greenwich. When we got off the train, we walked for a few minutes to Greenwich Park, the home of the Royal Observatory. The Prime Meridian runs right through the Royal Observatory, and that's where Greenwich Mean Time was kept. The Observatory as at the top of a hill in the park. You can see it in the picture on the right.

There are some great views of Greenwich and of the Thames River from up there. There are also lots of clocks and telescopes in the Observatory. But the coolest thing there is the Prime Meridian line. You can stand in two hemispheres at the same time, which we did of course.

After we walked around two hemispheres for a while, we went to the Queen's House and the National Maritime Museum, at the bottom of the hill from the Observatory, near the Thames River. The Queen's House has a really cool spiral staircase. The National Maritime Museum has lots of cool ships and stuff. We bought a little replica of the Cutty Sark there.

Afterward, we went to a Columbian restaurant back in London. The food was okay, but McKenzie's dancing was awesome. Check out the video. It was dark in there, so it's hard to see, but you get the idea.