LONDON — Thirteen hours of sleep is apparently the magic number for an almost-13-year-old — just enough after a trans-Continental-Atlantic-North-Pole flight to rejuvenate Will’s soul. Or at least his energy level.

We started late today (much to Rick’s chagrin — two hours late! How will we ever make our lunch reservation?!? First day of our itinerary, and we’d already blown it!), but managed to still get to St. Paul’s Cathedral by lunch. The cathedral, of course, is historic, gorgeous, inspiring, the site more than a thousand years of history — fires, weddings, bombings, funerals, burials. What struck us was both its grandeur, but also its restraint — not as flamboyant as St. Peter’s in Rome, but still with enough bling and soaring space to inspire you to look, and think, of the heavens. Will especially liked climbing the 500-plus stairs to the top of the dome (Courtenay only made it halfway, to the Whispering Gallery, since the stairs to higher galleries were tight and claustrophobic. A guide helpfully told me that no one has ever gotten stuck, and quite large people are even able to squeeze their way up, but I didn’t want to tempt fate and a panic attack.)

The soaring stained glass windows and memorial at the end of the church, commemorating Americans lost fighting in World War II, was also beautiful and moving. As were the stories of the several hundred Londoners who took shifts holding vigil, night after night, to put out the incendiary bombs that rained down on this symbol of British resolve during the German Blitz of 1940-1.

Rick had reserved us a hot table at a chop     house nearby — only to find out when we showed up that he had reserved it at a pub of the same name — and that the chop house of the same name was closed on Saturdays. Will declared the pub smelled bad, so with a hunger-storm-food-mood brewing, we took off for the appropriately named Bread Street and chanced upon a Burger and Lobster joint (surf and turf taken to extremes) that Will declared was our lunch spot. The lobster was rubbery, but hey, Will ate at least half of his bacon-and-cheeseburger we were able to forge on …. to the Museum of London.

Nothing is very far away in the center of London, so we sauntered over to the museum, built just on the edge of the 2,000-year-old Roman wall that once ringed the city. The museum traced the city’s pre-history, through the Roman times circa 55 BC to 407 AD, Anglo-Saxon settlement, Viking invasion, medieval, Renaissance, Restoration, up to the present. It was well worth a visit — though Will said he’d seen all the medieval stuff already in his fall Cultures class (thank you Paul Monheimer). I loved the Roman artifacts, while Will preferred the reenactment video of a gladiator fight. Rick seemed most fascinated by the medieval history, up to the great fire of 1666. We marveled that since Will has taken up saber fencing, he no longer demands we buy foam or wooden swords to lug around with our luggage. “I have enough swords now,” he said.

You will not believe this, but as I am talking to these yahoos about what they liked about the museum, they claim I, me, Courtenay, was the one who forced them to speed through the Victorian and modern ages. I was only trying to be nice, since Will seemed to be DONE with the museum experience. Rick says, “God, we spend an hour just looking at chipped stones, and then we had to get out of there…”

Next we headed off across the Millennium Bridge to the Tate Modern, a converted power station, which was extremely crowded, this being a Saturday. Rick interpreted the works, and we made a game seeing how close he was what the artist actually intended. He actually did pretty good — a lot of artists struggling with modernity and technology. Will found a painting called, “Grey,” which was very grey, and really only grey, most interesting. Rick liked a neon blue rust-encrusted engine that spoke to his soul. Or something. I guess we were getting tired and a little loopy.

We ended our day in a black cab, where Will rode in the jump seat, on the recommendation of his friend Iain. And at DaCorradi Italian restaurant, where Will ate enough Spaghetti Bolognese to send him into another 13-hour sleep. Buona Notte from London!