London: day 3

Our third day was much anticipated by all of us football fans. We were going to an English Premier League game! Our final destination is shown above, West Ham's London Stadium (more about the odd structure on the right later).

But in our typical fashion, we were able to combine some fun transportation options to get all the way across town to the game. First up, we caught the first Thames "Uber" boat leaving from Putney Pier, conveniently just upstream from our good ol' Putney Bridge:

We took this relaxing mode of transport all the way to Greenwich, seeing plenty of great sights along the way...

Victoria Tower and Houses of Parliament

RAF memorial: Per ardua ad astra

The "Shard"

Tower Bridge (much more about this icon in a later post)

Plus, it was just fun to ride the comfy boat (complete with loo and refreshment stand) and not have to make bus-tube connections...

Unfortunately we didn't have time to do any sightseeing in Greenwich, but we did get to take the under-Thames tunnel from the south to the north bank...

...where we caught a couple of Ubers (cars this time) to the Stadium—or at least to the vicinity of the stadium: on game days streets for blocks around are closed to vehicles, because people take mass transit and walk the last bit! What a concept!

An English friend meeting us for the game told us about a great lunch dining option right next to the stadium: the View Tube. Good food and great pre-game atmosphere—we saw no fights between West Ham and Nottingham Forest supporters, just a good time being had by all.

And a happy surprise for our Maine contingent: they featured beer from Portland!

Heading to the stadium, we even braved the crowds in the team store, and several of the grandkids came away with West Ham swag—they might have become Hammers fans for life now!

this was taken before the shop stop

This being West Ham's last home game of the season, there was a healthy crowd and it was so fun to be in a space with so many kindred-spirit-football-fans...

For those of my readers familiar with Premier League teams, you might ask if we saw the bubbles—yes, we did! There are bubble machines all around the pitch and they put them out in strength before the game and before the second half while they sing the "Forever blowing bubbles" song. Here's the official scoop on why this distinctly un-football-related song is sung, complete with bubble accompaniment at all West Ham home games. A wonderful example of the weirdness of sports  .

bubbles before the second half

More history: they're called the "Hammers" because their club was initially a company club of the Thames Ironworks, back in the late 19th century.

And as, almost everywhere you go in the U.K., there is a WWI memorial; a supporters' club must have enlisted en masse...

Now, about that intriguing structure outside the stadium that was in my first pic. It turned out to be much too intriguing for some of our party, as they opted to ride the slide that comes down it. You can see how crazy this notion is when you look at where the red lines are pointing in the picture here. That silver twisting tube is the slide!

All three of these brave and crazy folks (two dads and a just-barely-tall-enough granddaughter!) said it was terrifying. No duh! But they're glad they did it.

The whole structure was designed, they learned, by the same genius who gave us the "Bean" in Chicago. And it is very impressive as a sculpture. It wasn't built for the Hammers, but rather for the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, when London hosted the Olympics in 2012. This park abuts the stadium, where some Olympic events took place. The slide's official name is the Arcelormittal Orbit and it's touted as the longest and tallest tunnel slide—in. the. world. What a feather in the cap of those kids crazy enough to ride it!

After this breathtaking adventure, the tube ride home was pretty tame, especially since by the time we boarded the crowds from the game had thinned out considerably. Whew! What a whirlwind day!