Sing Along!

London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down ...

There isn’t a lot to do in the town of Needles, California so we decided to go back into Arizona for a day trip. 

Lake Havasu City is not far from the California/Arizona border.   We’ve never seen the London Bridge so we decided to visit this popular attraction.

Some interesting facts:

In 1967, the Common Council of the City of London began to look for potential buyers for the London Bridge. Lake Havasu City founder and entrepreneur Robert P. McCulloch placed the winning bid of $2,460,000 on April 18, 1968.

McCulloch came by this figure by doubling the estimated cost of dismantling the structure, which was $1.2 million, bringing the price to $2.4 million. He then added on $60,000 – a thousand dollars for each year of his age at the time he estimated the bridge would be reconstructed in Arizona. 

The vintage lamps on the bridge are made from the melted down cannons of Napoleon Bonaparte’s army.

The bridge is 930’ long.

Walking across the bridge.

When dismantled in London, England, each stone was numbered for re-assembly.  If you look carefully, you can see the numbering on many of the stones.

The bridge is home to hundreds of bats.  The inside of the bridge is hollow. When it was rebuilt, it needed to be able to accommodate auto traffic. During the reassembly, a steel framework was faced in granite, rather than using solid granite blocks, which reduced its weight from 130,000 tons to 30,000 tons, while strengthening the structure.

Couples are putting locks on the fence that surrounds the bridge and throwing away the key to symbolize their unbreakable bond.   Apparently these “love locks” are a tradition in Paris.

Hundreds of locks attached to the fence.

We also saw a couple of these authentic red phone booths.

London phone booth.

We walked around a little enjoying the sunshine:

I bought my souvenir magnet:

Then found one I liked better in another gift shop:

I like the ones that have the name of the state on them.