Friday we arrived at about 9:30 in the morning after a
smooth and uneventful flight. No issues, but we discovered that a taxi into
Mayfair from Heathrow is pretty darned expensive! We're staying at the Hyatt
Regency 'The Churchill' on Portman Square. It's a beautiful, relatively small
hotel just north of Oxford Street (for shopping) and a block away from Baker
Street (but at the wrong end for the Sherlock Holmes Museum), and not too far
from Marble Arch for the Tube and buses.
After checking in, we started heading toward the Thames and
the London Eye, the big ferris wheel on the riverside. We had reserved tickets
for Friday afternoon before leaving home and, since we weren't yet familiar
with the transit system, decided we'd walk the route suggested by the young
lady who checked us in at the hotel to get us there. It was partly a refresher
on the area we'd stayed in the last time we were in London a number of years
ago.
It's quite amazing that, for a city of this size and all the
attractions, there aren't very many restaurants in some areas. We ended up
stopping for lunch at a restaurant on the south side of the Thames, in South
Walk, because we couldn't find one anywhere between Buckingham Palace and the
Houses of Parliament.
 |
| Media tents from the world's news networks all waiting for news of the royal birth |
Here are a few shots taken from the Eye. You get a very
interesting view from up there. The full trip lasts about a half hour. The
wheel doesn't move very quickly, and there are frequent stops to allow
wheelchairs, walkers and other slower moving people to get on and off. But it
certainly gives a good bird's-eye view of much of the city. Unfortunately, some
of the interesting iconic buildings, like the Tower Bridge, are blocked by the
office towers.
Once we got off the Eye, we walked (slowly) back to the
hotel. On the way we found this:
Too bad we didn't take this route on the way down, or we'd
have had our lunch here for sure!
It was a beautiful, warm and somewhat humid day, and the
effects of the overnight flight were starting to take hold. We had a very nice
dinner at the hotel restaurant, the Montagu, and then called it a night. We
knew we'd have a long day ahead of us on Saturday, as we'd arranged to meet
Michel and Judy at 9:00 in the morning.
Saturday turned out to be 'culture day'. Once we met our
tour guides and bought our day passes for the transit system, we headed out.
First stop - the British Museum.
 |
| The main Rotunda. The library is in the round central section |
One of the largest in the world, it holds a large number of
very important pieces, like this one:
The Rosetta Stone, covered in fairly small writing, as you
can see, was the key to translating the Egyptian hieroglyphs. Like Tut's death
mask in Cairo, it is very hard to get anywhere near it!
Here are photos of just a few of the other exhibits we saw.
It's no wonder people say you can spend all day there and not be anywhere near
finished. And it's a free admission, too!
 |
| Osiris, looking like he's winking at you |
 |
| The diamond-studded pendant on a chain of office 1800s |
 |
| From the beer stein collection... |
After the British Museum, we took the bus to the British
Library.
 |
| A statue of Sir Isaac Newton, somewhat modernized |
It is a working library, but also has a few exhibit rooms,
including the one that holds two of the remaining three copies of the Magna
Carta of 1216. Unfortunately, you aren't allowed to take photos here, otherwise
we would also have been able to show you:
Jane
Austen's writing desk (a lap-sized fold-up tray with a solid writing area and
storage for pens, ink and paper) that her father gave her in 1794, as well as
one of her manuscript books - she had beautiful penmanship!
A page
from the original of one of Mozart's compositions - written on what must have
been a pretty bad day, going by the amount of scribbling out on it!
The
first pages from the original manuscript of one of Haydn's orchestral works,
with the staffs hand-drawn and the parts for at least eight instruments, all
identified and written out.
Letters
written by Oliver Cromwell and 'Prynce' Henry, who later became Henry VIII -
you know, the kind of people you know must have existed, but never thought
you'd see anything in their own handwriting!
After
the library, we took the Tube to Camden Lock, on the Grand Union Canal. Camden
Lock is in the middle of Camden Town (yes, the same one where Bob Cratchitt
lived in A Christmas Carol), but it looks a lot different than it did in the
late 1800s!
As it was Saturday, the Camden Market was open, and on the
sides of the canal, the mooring areas were filled, cheek by jowl as they say
here, with food stalls serving almost every kind of take-away cuisine you can
think of, except hamburgers!
We had decided to take a cruise along the canal toward
Little Venice, another of the higher-class neighbourhoods that Monica wanted to
see. One of her favourite authors writes a lot about certain parts of London,
so we're trying to get to see a few of them for ourselves. We found a boat,
paid the fare, and settled in for a ride of about 45 minutes. Here are some
pictures we took along the way:
The canal runs through a number of areas, including Regent's
Park and the London Zoo, before the boat ride ends in the Little Venice lake.
The most interesting area is in Little Venice, where there are some very
beautiful and large houses backing onto the canal.
After a short wander around the area, we stopped at the
Warwick Castle Pub for lunch and then headed back to our hotels to change for
dinner. On the way, we found a familiar figure -
We went to an Italian place, Prezzo, which is part of a
restaurant chain, and had a very good meal, before grabbing a cab to the theatre
which was over in the Charing Cross area.
Michel had arranged for tickets to see 'Relatively Speaking'
a 4-person farce that was written in the 1960s and is enjoying its current
revival. The story is a bit convoluted
but basically shows what can happen when you say just enough to leave your
words open to complete misinterpretation. It was quite funny.
Sunday morning we headed back down toward Buckingham Palace,
as Larry wanted to see the changing of the guard. Well, we had seen it in 1996,
and we weren't really all that interested in standing at the gate for hours to
get a good spot like we did last time, but we wanted to see the guards marching
in and out. So here are some photos:
While the guards were doing their thing inside the gates,
another event took place outside. A former soldier who had done multiple tours
in Afghanistan was just finishing a walk that was called 'Every Mile has a
Name'. He had walked 444 miles, one for each service person who was killed
during the war in Afghanistan, with a 100 lb pack on his back. His final few
yards to the Cenotaph on the Queen Victoria statue at Buckingham Palace just
happened to pass right by where we were standing. Here's a photo of him almost
at his final goal:
A great cheer went up from the people on the monument when
he finally dropped the pack. Way to go! He has also been raising money to help
veterans along his journey. We can only hope he collected quite a bit for his
efforts.
After leaving the palace, we hopped on the bus and headed
toward Sloane Street and Harrod's. Even though it was Sunday, it was quite
busy. Here are a few photos of the inside of this iconic store:
 |
| Sort of like at Eataly in NYC, you can sit at a counter and eat oysters, steak or seafood |
 |
| Fresh made scones, croissants and meringues |
 |
| How can you resist these London cupcakes? |
And we rode the escalator to the top to find the East
Dulwich Deli, where we had a light lunch:
 |
| The main escalator lobby. Not just this amazing decor, but there was a live soprano singing opera from one of the balconies. See her in the corner? |
And, of course, since all the world has been eagerly
awaiting news that the Duchess of Cambridge has finally gone into labour, we
couldn't pass up taking this photo of one of the limited edition baby items
that Harrod's has had specially designed:
After lunch, and since we were in the general area, we
headed down to Chelsea to find another one of those corners of London that
Monica wanted to see: Cheyne Walk. This is a small, historically rather
exclusive enclave down by the Thames, far from the hustle and bustle of
downtown but still close to shopping and business. Gordon Ramsay's first restaurant,
Ramsay, is about 5 minutes down the street from here. Larry saw it from the bus
as we headed back toward the hotel after our 'walkabout'.
 |
| George Eliot, the writer, apparently lived in this house for some time |
From there it was back to the bus, then the Tube, and finally
reaching the hotels again. Tonight we had tickets for the BBC 'Proms' at Royal
Albert Hall. The Promenade classical concerts are held in July and August every
year and are recorded by the BBC for TV. We saw the National Youth Orchestra of
the United States performing a brand new symphony by Sean Sheppard, an American composer,
some pieces by Tchaikovsky, during which they were accompanied by Canadian
violinist Joshua Bell, and a symphony by Shostakovitch. Here are a few shots of
Royal Albert Hall from our vantage point above side-stage. The building is
quite impressive no matter which way you look at it - except that it isn't air
conditioned and it was quite hot and sticky all afternoon...
 |
| Looking down on the orchestra from our vantage point |
We enjoyed the concert, despite the heat, except that we
wondered why Shostakovitch insisted on composing at least 5 minutes of music
for each letter in his name...and then stringing it all together with no truly
discernible connection (sorry; maybe we were too hot and tired to hear it, but
then again this was not long after hearing some very beautiful and cohesive
Tchaikovsky). At least the orchestra closed out with an American classic, a
Porgy and Bess medley by George Gershwin, that had the audience clapping for
quite a long time afterward.
Now, finally, we get to today, Monday. But before we could
really start out, we had to find a bank. It's become a bit of a running gag
that the cabbie on Saturday night didn't want to take Michel's 50 Pound note
because it was 'old' money. We had heard that the Bank of England was changing
the design of the notes, but not that the old ones couldn't be used any more.
And what was worse, Larry had given him the money to pay for our private
transfer to the ship - AND he had got the money directly from our bank at
home!!! Well, it turns out that there's nothing wrong with the money - the
teller even had some of it in her wicket - but some people just don't want to
take it any more. She changed it for them anyway, and we were able to go on
knowing that all of the cash would be good no matter where it was spent.
So we could start another adventure on the London transit
system as we wanted to go to the Tower of London, which is way down at the
other end of the city. Michel and Judy went with us to the Tower, but decided
not to do the tour, so they went off (leaving us to navigate the Tube alone on
the way back - white knuckles, anybody?) to see something that didn't require
quite as much walking.
So we toured around the Tower of London, not taking the tour
with the Yeoman Warder, but standing in line to see the Crown Jewels, and
followed that up with a tour of the Tower Bridge. Here are some photos of our
day:
 |
| The lineup to see the Crown Jewels - only took about 20 minutes to get through |
 |
| Larry and a buddy ready to defend the battlements! |
 |
| From the top of the Tower Bridge |
We had been looking forward to having some authentic fish
and chips for lunch at some point. Well, we didn't have too many options left,
and we had to eat something before climbing back on the Underground. We found a
restaurant just between the Tower and the Bridge and ate there. Here's how the
fish and chips looked - it tasted really good, too!
 |
| Complete with house made tartar sauce and bright green mushy peas with mint! |
But, of course, we weren't finished yet. Tonight, instead of
dinner, we were going to Brown's Hotel (another place on Monica's list) for High
Tea. After a successful journey back to the hotel without getting lost or
anything, we pulled off the quick change and met Michel and Judy.
A ten minute cab ride took us to Brown's, in Aldredge
Street, Mayfair. It is a very small hotel, but fairly exclusive, being near
Bond Street and all the exclusive shops. They usually allow you about an hour
and a half for high tea, but since it was Monday and our reservation was for 6
p.m., there was nobody after us, so we had a little more time. Standard high
tea fare: finger sandwiches with fillings like egg salad, smoked salmon, and
cucumber; raisin scones with clotted cream and home-made strawberry preserves;
small desserts, and finally Victoria Sponge Cake filled with more preserves and
cream. Yummy, but filling!
 |
| Michel with a selection of small desserts |
 |
| Hotel entrance. Tiffany's is right across the street... |
It was so filling that we decided
to walk around a bit to melt off some of those calories! We were not too far
from Fortnum and Mason but it was already closed when we got there (one of
those places to check out next time we're in London) so we headed back up Bond
Street to Oxford Street and walked all the way back to the hotels. So far we
figure we've covered somewhere around 50 km, not including the ones on the bus
or the Underground!!!
 |
| At the corner of Bond St., Larry found a statue he had read about of Roosevelt and Chamberlain |
 |
| Looking down Bond St. The building with the tower is Salvatore Ferragamo |
 |
| Fortnum and Mason |
Oh yes, as we walked past
Selfridges on Oxford Street we noticed that the outside of the store was all
lit up in blue. Not knowing any differently, we thought it might just be normal
nightttime lighting - until we got back to the hotel and turned on the TV to
find that the Duchess had finally had that baby! All we can say is:
1 - Congratulations to William and
Kate on their new addition, Baby Whosis, Prince of Cambridge,
and
2 - No, we won't have time to take
a photo of the birth announcement at Buckingham Palace.
As the myriad of reporters has
been saying for weeks now - "That's it from London! Hope you enjoyed the
show." We'll be back with more from the Caribbean Princess.
No comments:
Post a Comment