This was the day I was finally going to visit the London icon – Tower Bridge. But of course, I wasn’t going to go down to London just for the bridge, so I decided to group Tower of London with it. Tower of London is a historic castle just beside the Tower Bridge and is a UNESCO world heritage site. This is also the place where the crown jewels are kept, along with other royal regalia.

Tower of London and London Bridge are both such perfect symbols of the historic city. Tourists naturally flock to these places, so definitely be prepared for crowds.

The Tower of London provides free guided tours, which I highly recommend. They don’t last long – about 40 minutes, and you get to learn a lot about the castle’s history.

The guide also told us a really cute fact – the castle keeps 6 ravens as pets, tended to by an official ravenmaster. Apparently, there’s a superstition that states “if the Tower of London ravens are lost or fly away, the Crown will fall and Britain with it”. Make sure to keep an eye out for them!

The castle also houses a few museums which you can access. There are displays of armour, weapons and other medieval artifacts. The tower also once housed a Royal Menagerie, but the animals have long since been relocated.

Next was the main attraction, and what I had come for – the crown jewels. You see, I’m ethnically Indian, and have grown up hearing lots of complaints about the infamous Koh-I-Noor diamond, which currently sits on Queen Elizabeth’s crown. While I don’t particularly care about its politics, I thought it would be really cool to see it in person, and of course I was looking forward to taking a look at the other royal regalia as well.

I have to say, this was a really out of body experience for someone who is as middle class as they come. This was by far the most in-your-face showcase of wealth I have ever seen, with diamond encrusted crowns, swords, gold cutlery and yes, an actual silver spoon. There was a sceptre with a diamond the size of my freaking palm, just sitting there sparkling like as if it couldn’t feed the entire population of the UK for a year. You never truly understand what it means to be stupidly rich until you see generations’ worth of shiny royal objects all in one place. Too bad photos aren’t allowed.

Anyway, moving along from the shocking realisation of my averageness, I then headed to the Tower bridge! A fun fact I learnt was that this was not the London bridge, which is another, far less impressive bridge upstream. Kindergarten animated nursery rhymes had me fooled.

When in London, how can you not take a picture with this icon. That’s all for this day!