We had breakfast in the hotel this morning. It was a beautiful day and my train doesn't leave until lunchtime so we decided to walk over to Hyde park and enjoy some fresh air. There were some people swimming in the Serpentine. I don't care how nice a day it is, it's still April and that water must have been cold. I'm now back at the hotel packing up my stuff and making use of the wifi to do this blog entry before I catch my train.
Today was my last full day in London. We didn't have anything booked so we just spent the day wandering around looking at random things wherever we happened to be. London is great for that. Wherever you go there'll be something interesting to see. We got off the tube at Monument station. Showing my ignorance here - I didn't know what the Monument was even for. So you learn something new every day and I now know it's a Monument for the great fire of London, which began near that spot. You could walk up the 511 spiral stairs and get a good view from the top, but I wasn't ready to take on that much exercise that early in the day.
After that we walked a short way to Leadenhall market. I'd tried to come to this market on a weekend once. But being in the city it was only open during the working week. I've heard that this was one of the locations used in the filming of the Harry Potter movies.
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From here it was a short walk over to Trafalgar Square to visit the National Portrait gallery. We didn't bother with the more modern stuff but had a good look at the portraits of all the past monarchs and famous people like Shakespeare, Brunel and Mary Shelley.
By this time we were flagging, so we took a break in Leicester Square to watch a movie (Dune 2) and finished off the day with a very nice meal in the Bear and Staff just off the Square. Steak and ale pie which Becky followed up with sticky toffee pudding with clotted cream while I had the apple and blackberry crumble with hot custard. I'll diet tomorrow...
Today we took a journey over to Pudding Mill Lane to see a live Abba concert. We went wrong a couple of times on the journey but were still at the Abba Arena in plenty of time. London is the only place in the world you can see this show. They are talking about also putting it on in Las Vegas at some point but I guess they'll have to build a purpose built arena for all the technology.
I have no idea how the hologram technology works but it was amazing. Unfortunately they said that anyone found filming or taking photos after the show started would be removed from the auditorium. So you'll have to take my word for how amazing it was. Did some boogying on down with the rest of the audience to Dancing Queen and some of the other numbers.
After all that exercise we spent the evening in the hotel bar.
This morning we took the train to Kew and met up with our nice nieces and my friend Kris. I've been to Kew Gardens exactly once before 40 years ago. During that visit I passed a very interesting looking restaurant and decided I'd really like to go in there one day. Well it took 40 years, but today I finally managed it.
The 5 of us had a lovely afternoon tea at The Original Maids of Honour. A maid of honour is a sort of custard tart. Not hugely exciting in the 21st century but probably the bees knees back in Tudor times. The story is that these small tarts were enjoyed by the ladies in waiting in the Tudor court and Henry VIII therefore decided to name them maids of honour.
After our tea we crossed the road and went to Kew Gardens where we enjoyed ride on a Train that went all around the park.
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After that we visited the various glasshouses, before finishing off at the coffee shop and having a quick look around the boutique du tat. The rain held off, so it was a lovely day and so nice to see friends and family.
I had never been to Windsor before, so Becky and I decided to visit the castle during our time here in London. We took the train from Paddington to Slough and changed there for Windsor. We walked along by the Thames for a bit. Windsor seems to be overrun with swans and they are very large birds and quite intimidating.
After this we took a boat trip down to Boveney Lock and back which provided us with nice views of Windsor race course and various posh houses owned by people like Natalie Imbruglia, Michael Caine and Jimmy Page. We also passed some boys from Eton who were out rowing on the river.
After that it was off to a coffee shop for some hot drinks and scones with strawberry jam and clotted cream - yum.
We did a bit of souvenir shopping then headed to the castle for 1pm. The castle grounds are very pretty. We went in St George's chapel and saw the Queen's resting place. Also looked around the state apartments where there were some very impressive portraits of former monarchs. Unfortunately, photography was not allowed inside the buildings. So I had to content myself with views of the castle grounds.
So Air Canada sent me a couple of emails 24 hours prior to my flight. The first was encouraging me to check in online. The second was encouraging me to sign up to check in my carry on bag - because "Your flight is full" and there wasn't going to be enough space in the overhead bins. While I was waiting at the gate there were repeated warnings that everyone needed to check their carry on bags because there wasn't enough space. So I boarded and found my seat on the aisle. I didn't do up my seat belt though, because there were 2 other seats between me and the window and since this was a "full flght" the occupants should be along soon. So imagine my surprise as the captain came on and said we were pushing back. Not only were the 2 seats next to me unoccupied but the view of the rows across the aisle was like this:
So our "full flight" had about 1 seat in each row with an actual passenger in it and the flight attendant came by closing up the literally empty overhead bins. I did notice that as we landed they didn't even bother telling us to be careful because the contents of the overhead bins may have shifted during the flight.....
Despite having had a row of 3 seats to myself I didn't manage to get any sleep, so after landing and making my way to the Paddington Hilton and meeting up with Becky I took a couple of hours nap.
Shortly before lunch we walked over to Hertford House and viewed the Wallace Collection. To non-UK residents this will be a less familiar museum - but it's definitely worth a look. The collection of historical weapons and armour on the ground floor is impressive and there are many nice paintings on the upper floor. I particularly liked the Canalettos. The most famous painting in the collection is the Laughing Cavalier, and he was definitely laughing at us as we spent ages looking for him - only to eventually ask and be told that he was on loan to a gallery in Amsterdam. I wasn't sure if you could take photos at the museum, so I don't have any to post here.
On the walk back we dropped into Selfridges for a bit and had a look around the food hall where they had some very interesting "Shag cupcakes" and you could buy various flavours of cookie dough by the scoop as though it was ice-cream.
After that it was back to the hotel for a very early night as we are both still jet-lagged.
Off on another vacation. Flying to London tomorrow for a week in the UK. After that it's off to Venice for 3 nights. From Venice I board the Silver Spirit cruise ship for an Adriatic cruise. Watch this space!
