Australia Day in London!

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.

Off to the Lord's Ground

The majestic pavillion at Lord's Cricket Ground

One of the highlights so far has been our trip to St John’s Wood to visit the Lords Ground.

Laurie’s family has a significant history with Australian and English cricket. His great grand father on his mum’s side was George Henry Stevens (Harry) Trott and Harry’s brother, Laurie’s great uncle, was Albert Trott. Harry and Albert were great cricketers. In fact both played first class cricket for Australia, Harry being captain of the Australian side in the late 1890s to early in the turn of the century. Albert was not selected for the Australian side to tour England so sailed under his own steam on the same boat to play for Middlesex and the English first class side which would be playing against Australia in that season.

Albert was a sensational cricketer, a great all rounder who ended up with a batting average of 102, better than that of Sir Donald Bradman.

One of Albert’s great achievements, apart from his batting average and sensational bowling figures, was that he slogged a ball over the top of the Lords Pavillion into Grove End Rd next door. This has never been repeated despite many incentives being offered to players during first class matches played at Lords. The latest reportedly offered to English cricketer, Trescothic, to achieve the same feat - one million pounds!

Albert Trott

With this history we trekked to Lords looking forward to one of their guided tours, which are available year round. We were not disappointed being taken through the magnificent pavillion, the Long Room, the Writing Room, the Committee Room and the players’ change rooms. The pavillion is steeped in history with magnificent portraits of famous cricketers from many nations. It is all very upper class English with beautiful timber walls and fantastic wooden furniture. Walking through the place there is an atmosphere of almost reverence. Our tour leader told us that none of us would be allowed in on a match day because we would have to be (the boys that is) wearing shirt and tie, dress trousers and shoes, no jeans, trainers or walking boots! Dipped out on all counts!

Laurie at the Lord's Ground with the new media centre behind.

After the tour ended a staff member approached us and said he was a great fan of Albert Trott’s and felt his contribution to English and Australian cricket had been unrecognised. He escorted us to the nursery pavillion which is where the MCC trains its young cricketers. They have an extensive schools’ training program too. While we were there several indoor cricket matches were being played by young cricketers from a girls’ school. He showed us a large display board of photos of past cricketers, including Albert.

Paul Winters and Laurie in the Nursery Pavillion

This was a real treat and we thank Paul Winters sincerely for his help in appreciating the significance of Laurie’s cricketing family.

A quirky aspect to Lords is the recent inclusion of overhead lighting. There were so many objections from the neighbours that there are heavy restrictions on when they can be used. In fact when not in use they have to be lowered. They seem to operate on a telescopic system and actually fold under as well. Quite bizarre for such huge infrastructure and an incredible feat.

One of the lighting towers lowered and turned over out of the way!

After leaving the ground in drizzling rain we headed for the Abbey Road pedestrian crossing. And guess what, Laurie took the compulsory photo of me striding across the road. This activity is quite an issue for drivers as SO many people do it that it becomes difficult to continue along the road. I can’t imagine what it would be like in the middle of the summer tourist season.

THE Abbey Road crossing!

That is a fantastic benefit of travelling in winter. There are no queues, no timed entry into attractions and very relaxed staff because they are not under any pressure. The only problem occurs if you are silly enough to travel the tube in peak hour. This has happened to us a couple of times, once in particular the train was SO crowded we couldn’t even hang on to the grab rails. But we didn’t have to because the sheer volume of humanity held us vertical! There had been a signal failure on another line so those passengers had diverted their journey to avoid the delay!! God bless their cotton socks!

Out and About in London

Exploring London is wonderful. Mastering the tube map a breeze although the bus routes a little more challenging. But the Oyster card system is fantastic. You charge it up and tap it on a little scanner as you enter the tube station or bus and tap out at the end of your train journey. You don’t have to tap out of the bus. Of course the city is divided into zones and the system works out the cheapest fare for the journey you have made then debits the amount from your card balance.

In the first few days we just explored: Piccadilly Circus, Oxford Circus, Westminster, the Houses of Parliament, The London Eye (closed for maintenance), Trafalgar Square, St James Park. We just wandered by enjoying the fact that we could.

Kensington Palace Ready, settie, go!

The beautiful Lady Diana Memorial Fountain and Laurie on the edge!

On each day we would walk. One of our early walks was in Kensington Gardens. What an oasis. And so many people using them. Kensington Palace is certainly not at its best as it is in the middle of a major refurbishment. These gardens meld into Hyde Park and it was a wonderful surprise to stumble on the Lady Diana Memorial Fountain. This is more an ingenious waterfall thana fountain. The water appears to flow in opposite directions in a circle tumbling over various textures of marble. It is beautiful.

The water birds on the lake are incredible. On the way back we admired the magnificent Albert Memorial which is opposite the the Royal Albert Hall in Kensington High Street.

On another day an attempted walk to Holland Park didn’t quite work as it should have and we ended up totally in the wrong place and miles from home! We caught a bus home. Back home I realised just how dumb this was as Holland Park is effectively at the end of Earls Court Rd!!

After joining the National Trust in Australia which would give us free entry to Nat. Trust properties in UK I thought it would be good to visit one in London only to discover there is not a lot of choice - and certainly none of the iconic places we had hoped for. Never though, we decided lunch at the historic George Inn at Southark not far from London Bridge would be a good idea. What a place. It has been a working Inn for more than 300 years. The food was excellent and it was obvious THE place to go as it was full of locals. An excursion to Tower Bridge after lunch ended us - quite by accident - at a discreetly located marina next to the Thames where multi-million pound cruisers were moored.

The historic George Inn City Quay

Tower Bridge, the Tower of London & the River Thames

Our next stop - London

Hmm, 4 am wake up and into the taxi by 5 am! After a very wild drive around the back streets of New York, picking up many hapless early risers, we arrived at JFK at 7 am in time to check in for our flight which departed at 8.55 am! Again the security staff were thorough but friendly - an unusual combination at international airports. We were one of 16 jets queued for take off so despite taxiing out 10 minutes early we lost the advantage by having to queue! BA not as good as Cathay but the food was fine. Had all sorts of plans to watch lots of movies but slept for three hours instead! Arrived a little early with the help of a 220km/hr tail wind towards the end of the journey! On approach to London Heathrow we had to circle waiting for a spot to land.

Safely survived the taxi ride to Kensington, much calmer than the ride to JFK thank goodness. Our home for the next 10 weeks is awesome. Just as we'd hoped. Such a great location to London and with every convenience including a dishwasher. With four levels we discovered early to remember what needed to be downstairs and what needed to be upstairs! The bus stop is right outside and two tube stations a short walk on either side.

Sunday we thought a trip to Notting Hill for the market might be a good idea. We weren't sorry.

An interesting clothing shop with an amazing collection of hundreds of treadle sewing machines

After a heavy session of retail therapy at Tescos to stock up the pantry, we were amazed at the reasonable prices of goods. Two stand outs were bananas and tomatoes. 99p and one pound 40p respectively. As for meat, Tescos had a deal 'buy any three for 10 pounds'. We selected bacon, pork fillets and chicken fillets. For the equivalent of $A16 we took home eight pieces of pork fillets, four chicken fillets and at least 16 slices of bacon. The meat was beautiful.

The next thing to organise was communications! With my iPhone and MacBookPro bereft of internet access and Laurie's iPad in the same boat we felt rather isolated! O2 seemed to offer the best deals with 100 minutes of international calls and 500 mb of internet access for 15 pounds keeping me quiet. The little USB modem we borrowed was another win with 2gb of download for 15 pounds also. A five pound micro sim giving 1 gb of access for Laurie's iPad meant we were set to go with keeping in touch with everyone far, near and dear.

Times Square

Well the landing was challenging. Watching the snow piled up on either side of the runway into JFK was not re-assuring I can tell you. But on flicking over to under carriage view on the plane's external camera we could see the runway itself was pretty clear! Lucky! They explained we were allowed to land because we were a long haul flight. The shorter flights and local internal flights had been delayed or diverted. How lucky were we! We were actually five minutes early. Female Captain of course!

What a breeze arriving on American soil. A total turn around from 2000. There was a substantial wait for 'aliens'. They had staff on for US citizens while the rest of us 'plebs' waited in a queue. Then when the US citizens were processed they started on the rest of us. But once started it was quite efficient and the staff certainly very pleasant. Not a grumpy official anywhere. We'd pre-booked and pre-paid for a taxi to our hotel, Go Airlink. Really good, efficient and safe.

We were actually hungry when we landed as there had been no food service offered since dinner eight hours earlier. Hence we bolted for the hotel restaurant after checking in at the Crown Plaza Times Square. Really great room on the 38th floor - away from the traffic noise below.

At left Times Square from our hotel plus a very vibrant Times Square during the day

At - 7 degrees we thought an early night might be better than a late night wander so crashed for a great snooze. A stunning day greeted us and still at - 7 degrees we headed for the Empire State Building as we weren't sure how long the good weather would last for. Wow, what an experience. The clarity was amazing. After the snow you could see forever. We stayed for ages taking it all in then headed down to try for a Circle Line cruise around Manhattan.

The view from the Empire State Building towards JFK Airport - the snowy area in the distance

New York is laid out in a very logical way. Avenues go one way in numerical order and streets go the other way in numerical order. But do you think I could get my head around it. No-one said the avenues go north south or east west or whatever or that the streets go any which way either. And of course there is streets west and east of where? Who knows where the centre line is that turns one from being east of to one that is west of....! As for a north point on a map which would give me some hope of working it out... nope...not a north point to be found.....!

I'm sure someone will explain it to me one day.

Not withstanding my geographical ineptitude we seemed to find our way around. Talk about pounding the pavement. We walked from 42nd street to 33rd street to discover that the cruises in winter are only at 10am and 4pm! So we'll try again tomorrow.

On the way back we found a TKTS (tickets) outlet which offered half price theatre tickets. We thought Chicago might be a good thing to see in New York so queued for ages waiting for the office to open at 3pm. What luck. For $US72 each we were sold tickets 13 rows back from the front. They were corkers. It was a great production.

The next day - so much for being at the ferry terminal by 9.45am, we didn't wake up until 9.45!

There's always this afternoon. It was still fantastic weather, mind you -10 degrees this morning.

Absolutely freezing. Donned the thermals today. We ventured up to the Top of the Rock - that is the Rockafella Building for some more views of New York from a slightly different perspective this time. Closer to Central Park which looked magical from the view point.

Once back on terra firma we headed for Central Park. What a wonderful place. Covered in snow it is just like we have seen in many movies made in New York. The stark contrast of the deciduous trees against the white snow was amazing. Including very cute squirrels trying to scratch around for food under the snow.

Laurie in Central Park

A seriously cute squirrel who totally ignored us as he dug for food under the snow in Central Park

Ice skating on a rink in Central Park

The Information Centre in Central Park

Time to head for the cruise which we were pleased would be a part sunset cruise setting off at 4pm for two hours so back at dark. It was so interesting, particularly from the perspective of the impact of the September 11 terrorist attacks on New Yorkers. There's still a lot of work to do to bring Ground Zero to the memorial that is planned for the location.

The business district of New York - Wall Street

Sunset on Ellis Island

Returning to the Circle Line wharf after the cruise

The day after our cruise was the second anniversary of the passenger jet landing in the Hudson River. The cruise boat we were on was one of the ones integral in the rescuing some of the 155 passengers from the jet.

The worst thing about eating out in New York - everyone seems to serve the meal with 'Home Fries'! These seem to be boiled potatoes that have been fried in something or other and added to some sort of gooey sauce. Indescribable really. Pass!

Looking forward to heading for England.

New York, here we come!

On our way from Hong Kong to New York, Mt Fuji in Japan standing out plainly from the scattered cloud

Things sounded dodgy for landing in New York. After all the snow they'd had on Boxing Day, more was forecast with a similar intensity for the Wednesday of our arrival. Gulp! 15 hours is a LONG time in an aeroplane. Watched too many movies and ate some very good food. Again, Cathay Pacific has to be the best. Couldn't fault anything about the flight, the staff, the food, the service...the works.

Hours of flying over Canada and America showed snow-covered country for as far as you could see

The most amazing thing about this leg of the journey was the amount of snow across southern Canada and northern America. For hours the country was covered in snow. There wasn't a cloud to be seen. Just hundreds of kilometres of snow-covered country with tiny dots of buildings, half frozen lakes and roads often half covered in snow. I got into trouble for having the blind up on our porthole! Well, not really. I was asked to put it down as people were asleep. It occurred to me that if they were asleep they wouldn't know the blind was up!! Ho hum! It had been fun watching the incredible sight of so much snow.

Even the beach was covered in snow as we circled to land at JFK airport at New York

Off to Hong Kong

After a hectic 2010 a very special day arrived, Saturday, January 8, when Chris and Amy were married in the Timbertop Chapel. The festivities continued until it was time for us to leave for Hong Kong.

Tuesday, January 11 and at last we were on our way.

The 8 hr journey was uneventful and thankfully punctuated by very good food and a great selection of movies. Cathay Pacific has got to have the best leg room on earth, apart from business class of course.

Arrived late evening to check in at the Regal Airport Hotel to a very fine room. By the way customs and immigration have been a breeze so far. The staff very pleasant and happy!! Unheard of for immigration officers.