Ben Franklin, Jeremey Bentham and the American visitors

Well we managed a weekend to ourselves after visitors large and small - firstly my first cousin Emily and her fella Josh who had spent the previous few weeks doing the Eurail thang - they seemed rather knackered - the sign of a good trip I say but we managed a perfomance of Richard III in St Johns College gardens and a trip to london which coincided with London bike day which made things interesting. Our visitors decied that theyd like so see the London palaces as fortunately the bus dropped us on Park Lane - after a brief pause at the Hard Rock Cafe for Josh to buy a t-shirt for Josh towards Buckingham Palace and across St James's Park where we encountered a Green plaque to Jeremy Bentham the father of utilitarianism of particular interest with regards my reading of Hard Times (Bentham BTW is preserved at University College where he has been taken to College Councils where he is noted to be present but not voting)We wandered down to Westminster Abbey wheer we baulked at the rather hefty £18 entry fee and then detoured down Whitehall which we rather cheekily called half a palace as it was designed originally to be one. We ended up in Trafalgar Square for the obligatory photo shot before heading to Covent Garden via Craven Street and the home of Benjamin Franklin - founding father, author, printer, political theorist,scientist, musician, inventor, statesman, diplomat and all round smartarse. We supped a the wonderful Stamfords bookshop after the required visit to the Tintin shop where a barbecue apron was purchased. Because of the visitors and also our restricted travelwe didnt have a whole lot of time but the peeps seemed happy enough with their London day.