Orbs, towers and globes

Posted on April 12, 2012 by wonko

We woke to an alarm, after another strange night sleep, breakfasted, packed, rugged up (we learned about being cold yesterday so was determined to have enough layers to manage it today) and headed to the West Kensington district rail station, headed east to Tower Hill in time to queue for tickets to the castle known as The Tower of London.

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After exploring a little on our own we headed to see the Crown Jewels before the crowds and had a reasonable amount of time to examine some astonishingly beautiful gems, crowns, maces, scepters and orbs. The amount of gold and other precious stuff there did seem a little obscene but so beautiful as well. We then headed to a tour guided by a Yeoman Warder (or “beefeater”) – a larger than life chap who regailed the large group with many tales, some of which must be true

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After the Tower of London, and a welcome tea break, we walked along the Thames to the Tower Bridge and toured the upper levels – an amazing engineering feat for the time.

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Lunch sitting on broad concrete steps beside the Tower Bridge and then a brisk walk to The Design Museum

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We walked through old wharf complexes, lovely ironwork walkways between buildings, very steam punk I thought. The Design Museum was fascinating, so much to see and think about. We had originally planned to walk from there to Shakespeare Globe but are so glad we hailed a cab (our first London Taxi experience) which wended amongst some of the most terrifyingly narrow streets – soooo glad I am not trying to drive in London.

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The tour of the Globe Theatre was fantastic, such an interesting building and the tour guide was very entertaining – we have had great luck with guides, they can make or break the experience and if you are lucky you get real nutters who are a lot of fun. After the Globe, we walked across The Millennium Bridge (aka the wobbly bridge, sadly it was rock solid for us) towards St Pauls for more amazing views of the city.

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Tube back home to collapse, consume tea and then cook dinner whilst wrestling with the vague instructions on our automatic clothes washer/drier – neither function adequately achieved first time through. What an amazing day

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Grocery shopping can be a tourist attraction

Posted on April 12, 2012 by marjo

So far we have been grocery shopping twice. First time was a small suburban Tesco Express; similar in size to a suburban 7Eleven but I must say much better stocked. Australian 7Eleven’s seem to have aisles after aisles of junk foods like chips, sweet and biscuits. In the Tesco Express we found small ranges of most products found in larger supermarkets including a wide range of fresh meat. Perfect for us self caterers. Prices were very reasonable too – $AUD4 for a small full chicken breast, $AUD1.35 for 1 litre of skim milk, $AUD2 for a loaf of grain bread.

We could have spent a lot of time in the large Tesco we visited the next day. The deli counter was huge but had no customers – wierd. There were so many cheeses, cold meats, and ‘pork pie’ type products. We can’t wait until we hit the food sections of the big stores in central London in a few days time. There was a butcher serving at the meat counter so I didn’t have to buy 500 grams of beef mince when I wanted less. There were a variety of bagel products but alas there were not the real deal. We did however find Jammie Dodgers of Dr Who fame – $AUD0.88 for a pack of bikkies.

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The wheels on the bus go round and round…

Posted on April 11, 2012 by wonko

We awoke blearily after a strange nights sleep following our epic transit and had a comforting breakfast.20120411-172950.jpgPacked lunch, water, fruit and headed to the train station to catch a commuter train to Green Park to join up with the “Big Bus” hop off/hop on again tour service that does all day circuits of the city. We had the option to pre-buy these tickets in Oz but decided not to in case we were to shattered from the traveling but in the end we just thought ‘bugger it’ and went. What a great choice. We got commentary, got our bearings and got to see most of the city and we could get off and explore a little along the way.

20120411-173918.jpgWe HEARD “Big Ben” the bell, high upon the St Stephens tower on the north end of Westminster Palace as it bonged 12, we lunched near Cleopatras Needle, we walked the bridge towards the London Eye

20120411-174516.jpgWe then took a cruise on the Thames to see a different view of the city, right up Tower Bridge, viewed from a distance the castle known as the Tower of London and generally had a awesome time.

20120411-174904.jpgThe day was exhausting, and with a couple of restorative tea stops we headed off to Notting Hill and then walked Holland Park (our home namesake) only to discover it is a really posh suburb centered on a lovely park that was bursting with spring blooms.

20120411-175124.jpgAmazed by the lush greens and vital colors (drenched by a sun shower then real torrential rain,then baked by sunshine – yeah, it confused us as well) we saw our first squirrels – lovely little varmints (that taste like chicken, apparently) with the softest, bushiest tails you can imagine.

20120411-175417.jpgWe wearily trudged to a larger Tescos, did some grocery shopping (finding things the express did not have) and then trudged home in a thunderstorm to collapse and revive. What a huge but brilliant day – now we know where the things we want to see are, how to get to them, approximate routes and distances. We also learnt a little macro history/structure of the city we plan to get much more familiar with in the coming week.

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