Tourism is hard yakka.

Just spent a solid 5 days sightseeing in and around gorgeous London. You can't go a metre in this town without tripping over a crypt of a famous dead guy - literally, in the case of Westminster Abbey - or a South American school group - literally anywhere interesting in London.

I've been starting the day with a Starbucks latte (desperate times and measures) and seemingly the promise of a day filled wth more of the blue stuff and bright yellow thing in the sky.

First things first, which is how first things often works. Today began with a smooth cruise down the Thames, from Westminster to the Tower Bridge, catching the sights of landmarks such as the Shard, the Gherkin, the walkie talkie, distant views of stunning St Paul's and the Tower of London, the latter of which is the only interesting thing down river of Westminster. The rest of the junk on the banks of the Thames looks like it's competing in an ugly building competition.

After spending 20 minutes looking for a loo, we went back up river via the cruise boat and hit the mean streets of the City of Westminster that accommodate the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey and pesky pickpocketers.

As is often the case, I was in no mood for pickpocketers. To this end, I hatched a plan to behead anyone who dared bump into me with a plastic fork, part of my three pronged approach - the others being salt and pepper -  in the case of a salad emergency.

Turns out it's a bit difficult to make your way through the moneyshot areas of Westminster without being pushed, prodded, and dragged along with the tourist tide. Yep, Westminster has a rip.

We then popped into the very beautiful Westminster Abbey, the famous 10th century gothic church, to undergo the obligatory tour, which was easy on the London Pass because your fast pass entry guarantees that you don't have to queue with the peasants, and you get a free crypt if you spend more than 100 quid in the giftshop.

The Abbey is where Wills and Kate married in 2011 in an intimate ceremony in front of two billion of their closest friends and family.

Despite the enormity of its ceilings, it actually does feel quite intimate inside.  I didn't realise that the far end of the Abbey is essentially a cemetery, housing the crypts of Henry V, Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, and many famous poets and writers. So fabulously creepy.

That section of the Abbey sort of resembles one of those TV shows about hoarding, where the occupant can't move in their house without walking into a pile of newspapers or stubbing their toe on the crypt of a dead monarch. And most of them are wearing their "death masks", because that's not creepy at all.

London may not look big on the coffee stained tourist pocket map but it's a bit of a hike to get to the places the tourists congregate, ie the pretty places with oodles of history attached to them.

Not blogging much this trip. Too tired. Tourism is hard. Poor me. I have thoughts and opinions on the Tube, so maybe tomorrow I will catalogue such rivetting things here.