Op London Tower ELW

On the 25th October a group from ELW descended on London for a FD trip to the Tower of London.

MT arrived at Hook train station to take advantage of the short journey to London Waterloo. Looking forward to exploring the Tower of London, the train cabin was full of excitement, anticipation and coffee.

Once arrived at the Tower, we collected the tickets and promptly moved to the queue where we were ushered through with ease. Upon entering the Tower and getting caught up in the hustle and bustle of the themed events and just how busy the Tower was due to the many tourists on school holidays. We quickly made our way to the first area of interest where the first of 4 Stands was about to be delivered.

The 4 stands were delivered, educating us on the history and relevance of the current RAF. The first two stands were delivered by AS1 Houghton and AS1 Scott at Beauchamp Tower where we would discuss the leadership/followship of the monarchs as well as the quite relevant case of Guy Fawkes.

Once these discussions were complete, we moved onto exploring this area of the tower whilst moving around the Bell Tower, Wakefield Tower, Lanthorn Tower whilst making our way to the Bowyer tower for the third and fourth Stand.

The third was delivered by AS1 Horrod in relation to the Duke of Wellington whilst the final (fourth) Stand was a team effort between AS2 Ella and AS2 Wynn who went on to discuss the formation of the Royal Fusiliers.

After all the stands had been completed, we head off to explore the other areas, particular interest was the White Tower which had some impressive weapons, armoury and displays from around the world whilst others enjoyed the Bloody tower for the mystique surrounding it. Whilst we all would have loved to visit the Crown Jewels the queue was simply too large for the time we had to get around, at the point of exploring the possibility of seeing the Crown Jewels the que was in excess of 2 hours. A group decision was made to finish up, head for a late lunch to discuss and debate what we’d just experienced.

A great day exploring and learning about the Tower of London and all its secrets. A huge thank you has

Display in the White Tower Display in Bloody Tower Display in St Thomas Tower

to go to AS1 Akling who arranged the event but sadly was unable to attend as well as a thank you to AS1 Houghton for stepping in at the last minute to follow through on AS1 Akling’s efforts.