30th December - Hampton Court

We took the tube out to Waterloo this morning. On the way to the tube station we passed this small green  cabin near our hotel which I thought was worthy of a mention.

This is a Cabman's Shelter.  They were built back in Victorian times when cabmen were seated up on top of a horse drawn carriage,  exposed to the elements.   The cabins provided a place where the drivers could shelter in bad weather and get a hot drink and something to eat.  Inside there's a small kitchen (see the chimney  on top) and some small bench seating. However,  you  can't go inside  if you're  not a registered  London  taxi driver.  You can get a cup of tea and a bacon butty and a cup of tea from the window on the end though.   This particular Cabman's Shelter is very close to our hotel. There were over 100 of these shelters around London at one time, but now only about a dozen  remain and they're listed buildings.

Also, on the way to Waterloo  tube station  we passed  Harrods,  looking very splendid  in all its Christmas  finery.

From  Waterloo  wecaught a train out to Hampton  Court.  It's been  many many years since either of us last came here.

The Palace is very interesting with lots of different  areas from times  when  different  monarchs resided there.  

The Tudor areas of the Palace are the most well known,  but there were also William III's apartments and a Georgian section. George II was the last monarch to use the Palace,  after that the Royal family moved to Buckingham Palace. 

The gardens are beautiful  too.

After much walking around the Palace and it's grounds we made our way over the road to a place called the Coppernose Cafe for something to  eat, before heading  back to the train  station for the return  journey  to London.   

It had been a long day and Becky is still a bit under the weather with her cold so we decided  to spend the rest of the evening indoors and  ate in the hotel  bar.

December 29th - Little Venice and Camden Market

Just near Paddington is a less well known  area of London where 3 major canals intersect and many houseboats are moored. We walked from Paddington station  this morning,  alongside one of these canals to the intersection (an area known  as Little  Venice).

We had intended to stop for a while and then  return to Paddington  to catch the tube to Camden.  But what should we come across  but a narrow boat waterbus that was heading to Camden  Lock.  So we got on that and had a very  interesting 45 minute trip along the Regents Canal down to  Camden.   

The route included going through Regents Park behind the zoo, so we got a free view of some of the animal enclosures. 

When we got to Camden  it was absolutely  heaving. We had intended to get some street food from the market for lunch, but there would have been no way to stand somewhere to eat so we immediately gave upon that idea and decided to head out of the area on the tube. 

In fact congestion around Camden Town tube station  was so bad that they weren't  letting  anyone in.  So Becky and I had to make our way to Mornington Crescent.  I played the Finchley Central  variation while Becky played the reverse court rules and we both arrived simultaneously. 

After  this we went to Leicester Square and watched Wicked at the cinema,  followed by a nice meal in an Italian restaurant.  The evening was rounded out by some shopping on Oxford Street. 

December 28th - A Pub Crawl Around Becky's Old Haunts

We started the day by taking the tube to Russell Square, and from there walking to Queens  Square (where Becky used to live, when she worked in London  back in the 70s).

This is the National Hospital,  where she used to work. 

After that we decided to stop for  a drink. The first place we tried was the Princess Louise, which is a former gin palace with supposedly sumptuous decor. Unforunately,  it wasn't  open yet (which was odd as some pubs were). I couldn't even  take a photo of the inside as the windows were all made of etched glass.

Instead, we walked back to Queens Square and had some mulled wine in Becky's old local: The Friend at Hand.

As well as being a very nice pub in its own  right. The Friend is also famous  for turning up in the lyrics of Grizabella the Glamour Cat from the musical Cats.

From here it was off to Leicester Square to try and see if we could get cheap tickets to a show for New Year's Day,  but nothing seems to be on that day.  By now it was almost  2pm so we decided to stop for a late lunch. 

We walked past Green Park  checking out few pubs like this one on the way

Eventually,  we ended up at Shepherds  Market,  where we had a nice meal at The Kings Arms. 

It was a damp day so we decided to return to the hotel at tea time and spent the rest of the  evening  washing our hair and watching TV in the hotel room.

27th December - The Long Road back to London

We originally planned to  return to London  from Nottingham  by train. However,  we were  unable to get  a train ticket  as all the trains out of  Nottingham that day were fully booked.  I don't know  if it was a reduced  service  that day or what.  Instead we ended upon a national express coach to Victoria.   Progress down the M1 was slow due to thick fog and then it turned out that the driver had to have a break as he had gone over his legal limit of driving without a break.  So we pulled off at Toddington services for 30 minutes.  By the time we got back on the road there had been an accident and we were stuck in a traffic jam for ages. We eventually  got into  Victoria  nearly 2.5 hours late.  The plan had been to get a taxi from  Victoria to the hotel.  But after waiting  at the taxi rank for 10 minutes there were no taxis to be seen so we decided to try the underground instead. Victoria is vast and it took us 10 minutes of walking around with our cases before we even found the underground station.  It was only 2 stops to South  Kensington,  but when we got off there were no lifts or escalators, so we had to lug our cases up 2 flights of stairs.    We were totally exhausted when we finally made it to our hotel. 

The hotel is ideally situated for our New Year's Eve party at the Natural History Museum  as we are right across from the Victoria and Albert  museum (which is right next door  to the NHM).  

 

Both of us are under the weather with  colds so we may not end up doing much tomorrow. 

December 22nd - Singalong and brunch

Today was our last day in London  before  heading to Nottingham  for Christmas  with the  family.   We went to Leicester Square and had a very fun time watching  a Singalong  performance  of The Muppets  Christmas Carol  at the Prince Charles  cinema.   Father  Christmas  came to say hello and what special sound effects  we needed  to provide (boo whenever scrooge did something  nasty, etc).  I think we were the loudest people  when singing along to the songs.  

We had a quick look around the Christmas market in Leicester Square and attempted to go to fortum and  masons (but it was too packed to move) then headed  for a bar (surprise  surprise) to kill a couple of hours, before  heading to our 5pm "brunch" appointment at Hakkasan.  It was a 5 course brunch which included a cocktail and  half a bottle of champagne  each.  Yummy!

After brunch it was back to the hotel for an early  night as we were leaving  for Nottingham  first thing in the morning. 

The blog will be on hold until the 28th as we will now be spending a few days with family over the holiday.  I'll  resume  when we get back to London. 

December 21st. Afternoon tea and a pantomime

Roxane arrived in Paddington  around 10am and dropped off her bags in our room. Then Alex joined us and we went to Oxford  circus and shopped for a bit before  heading to the  Langham for our afternoon tea.

After eating enough for the whole day we finally  rolled off to the pub for a cider before heading for the Palladium. 

The pantomime  was hilarious. 

December 20th - Christmas Lights

Spent the morning in Trafalgar Square admiring the big tree. There was a small Christmas  market that we looked around and then we went into St Martins in the Fields where there was some sort of concert rehearsal going on.   After that we spent some time in Waterstones perusing the books and having a coffee. 

We walked up Regent St and went to Hamleys, but it was packed so we decided  to go for lunch instead and ended up in the St James Tavern near Chinatown,  where we had steak and venison pie followed by sticky toffee pudding and  custard.  

In the evening we took a ride on an open top double  decker ride  to view the Christmas  lights. It was a bit damp, but we had some good  views and looking down at the crowds of shoppers  (who were packed like sardines), it was nice to be in the bus and not on the street.  

Mayflower and ships of the Rotherhithe

Started the day by walking to Hyde Park.   We had coffee in the cafe overlooking the Serpentine.   We had intended to visit the  Winter Wonderland  thing in Hyde Park,  but it turned out to have  an entrance fee and given that we didn't want  to go on any of the rides anyway we decided to give it a miss and walk on through Hyde Park  to Knightsbridge. 

We spent a while looking around Harrods,  especially  the  food halls, but managed to resist buying anything. 

After that , we took the tube to Bermondsey and had lunch at a very old pub called The Mayflower.   The Mayflower (yes that Mayflower) was originally  moored at the back of the pub before sailing to Southampton to meet up with the  Speedwell.   Very nice steak pie and mash, followed by apple and pear crumble with custard,  and a couple of glasses of mulled wine thrown in for good measure.   

Then it was time to go meet up with our guide, Tim, who was taking us on a guided walk around the Rotherhithe area.  Lots of interesting  historical buildings  and fascinating  snippets of information.    The  views of the city from the banks of the Thames  were also outstanding.  

The  only problem  was that the  weather  was really  chilly today, so after the walk we headed back to the hotel for a hot bath and spent some of the evening in the hotel  bar having some more hot mulled wine (purely  to warm me up guv, honest).   Another  early  night tonight after all that walking. 

18th December - Getting the lay of the land

Arrived at Heathrow  this morning and made my way over to terminal  3 to wait for Becky's plane to land.  Becky  was traveling with our friend  Annette.   So all 3 of us had a coffee and a natter before Annette  had to head off home in her car.

Becky and I took the Heathrow express to Paddington,  but it was too early to check in, so we spent a couple of hours hanging out in the  hotel bar and having some very nice brie and cranberry toasties for lunch.   

After checking in and having a quick shower (it's pretty  mild in London and I'd been wearing my Canadian  winter  coat on the plane), we got straight on the tube and went over to Covent garden to enjoy the Christmas  decorations and do a bit of shopping.

From there we walked up Regent St to admire the lights and then into Carnaby St.  Just off Carnaby St was a lovely  little  area called Kingsley  Court.

In Kingsley Court we found a bar called Cahoots in an old London  Underground ticket office.  So we went in and had a mulled wine.  

As neither of us had slept well on our flights,  we were pretty worn out and headed  back to  the hotel  for an  early  night.

London for Christmas

Off to the UK tomorrow for Christmas and New Year.. 
Spending some time in London and then Christmas with the family in Nottingham.

Back to London

We were up early to journey from Lucerne  back to Zurich  airport for our flight back to London.   Trafalgar had laid on a special  bus to Zurich airport  as there were no direct trains and making connections  while carrying all our luggage would  have been awkward.   However,  there was only the 1 bus, so we had no choice but to arrive at the airport about 5 hours early  for our flight.  

Don't have any photos today as it was all spent traveling.  We managed to use up the last of our Swiss Francs at the airport and arrived back at Heathrow about 3pm.  

This evening  we're staying at the Hilton in  Terminal  2 and we've spent a couple  of hours in the  Runway  Bar again.

Tomorrow  I'm meeting  a friend  in London, while Becky is staying in the hotel  to do her laundry and wait for her friend  who's  flying in from the US. 

Exploring Lucerne

Becky  and I decided not to  join any of the excursions  today and explored Lucerne by ourselves instead.   We spent  the morning on a 3 hour cruise  on lake Lucerne. 

Arriving back in town,  went across  the  chapel bridge and took a quick look inside the Jesuit church where I managed to miss a step and end up on my bum. Becky thought it was hilarious. 

We  had crepes for lunch and did some shopping in the chocolate shops before heading  back to the hotel for our farewell meal.   I don't have any photos  of the meal because I decided not to take the tablet with me and just enjoy the company of the lovely people we've  met on this trip instead.