Bit of a fluke really to find that Barb and Craig Jones from Piries would be in London for a few days overlapping with us. They arrived on the Tuesday (25th) so we arranged to meet for breakfast next day which happened to be Australia Day! They were staying near Notting Hill Gate so caught the tube to Kensington High Street (one stop) where we’d previously found a really nice French Cafe Restaurant called AuBain. What we hadn’t checked out were the prices. Hmmm. Anyway we did enjoy the beautiful (if small in quantity) equivalent to Eggs Benedict with Hollandaise (on the side of course) and smoked salmon. Four of those, three lattes, a Darjheeling pot of tea and a small quantity of bread - wait for it - 70 pounds. That’s $111. Ouch! Ah well it was very nice.
It was great to catch up with Barb and Craig - we hardly ever see them at home so it was really funny to see them in London but excellent to swap family news. They were at the start of their four week European trip.
There didn’t seem to be any celebrations of Australia Day that we could find. However one party hire shop in Kensington High Street had a full-sized Australian Flag in the window!
For some time now I had been eyeing off a red coat at Mark and Spencers. It’s the colour over here. Anyway I finally plucked up enough courage to try one one but it was too short in style. Anyway I’ve got that out of my system. Laurie’s probably happy about that!!
With the weather a bit dodgy we thought we would go to the movies. We’d spied the Odeon Cinema on our Earls Court ramblings. We hadn’t seen the King’s Speech with Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush so thought a matinee might be good. What a movie. I could have turned around and walked back in for a second screening, it was so good. If you get a chance you just have to see it! The story keeps coming back to mind. Very thought provoking. What a King he was - conquering his affliction.
Off to See the Queen
We’d had several attempts to see the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace but for various reasons had not succeeded, however we persevered and found ourselves at last in the right place at the right time. I would hate to be there in the height of summer. The Queen Victoria memorial in front of the Palace was crawling with people. That is the place to be - but you’d have to arrive early enough to grab a spot. We were happy with our perches at the front gates but still didn’t see a lot until we crossed the road next to Green Park and watched the guards on horse back continue on to their home at the Horse Guards nearby.
It’s one of those events that you have to do, but once achieved that’s good and on to the next thing. The day we were there it certainly wasn’t as sensational as the promotions imply. Liz really needs to do something about her front garden. It’s just red scoria!
Titanic and the 02 Bubble
In our wanderings we found that the Titanic Exhibition was on in London and thought it a great opportunity to learn about some recent maritime history. We were puzzled at what the 02 Bubble could possibly be and were soon to find out it was that UFO type thing with “feelers” sitting out of it that sits by the Thames near Greenwich. It was formerly known as the Millennium Dome. In fact this structure was used in the filming of the James Bond movie, The World is Not Enough.
We took the tube to get there - fantastic system - it was a long trip on the Jubilee line to North Greenwich but a reasonable walk to the dome, although in a freezing cold wind. The exhibition was awesome with more than 300 exhibits which had been recovered, stabilised and restored to a condition where they could be displayed in specially controlled conditions. The quirky aspect to the exhibition was that our entry tickets were replicas of the Titanic boarding passes. On the reverse side of each was a name and family history of a real passenger who set sail on the ship’s first and final voyage. We didn’t find out until the end if ‘our’ character survived or not.
The other sad but also interesting statistic was the proportion of first class passengers who survived which way out numbered the proportion of second class and steerage passengers who survived. Each and every name of the passengers were listed at the end of the exhibition - two separate lists - the survivors and those who were lost. Both our passengers survived.
Of the 2200 passengers and crew on the ship, 1500 people lost their lives and 700 survived. Th exhibition was presented in a way that was interesting, factual and respectful of those involved.
When we collected our coats and bags from the cloak room the attendant suggested we return to London on the Thames Clipper. What a great idea. We used our Oyster cards again, easy as pie and thoroughly enjoyed the ride zigzagging from bank to bank as we collected more passengers on the way back to Embankment. It was sunset and the city looked lovely as the lights were coming on. All in all we had a very satisfying day.
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