another suitcase in another airport...

oh woe is me... i am headed back eastward and to perth. i can hardly believe it's over. almost anyway. enough that it counts. :)

and i think that london is weeping with me as it's been raining all day, so i didn't get the things done that i had planned. no hyde park or portobello road shopping. but i did manage to take in a couple of sights, so i'll share them with you, as you commiserate with me.

started out at the enbankment station this morning. wanted to get a "doctor who" shot of the london eye. for you fans out there, you will recall first episode, first season with christopher eccleston and billie piper.


walked a little way along the other side of the thames, sprinkling rain. this side had griffin benches instead of the swans.



not even close to the tardis i know, but i love that the uk still has these sort of public telephones about the place.


went looking for downing street and came across the horse guards.


when i did come across downing street i had to take stock of all the changes that have happened in the intervening 30 years. my dad went to the uk in 1978 - you should see the pictures of him in a burt reynolds moustache... ha... anyway, he has a picture of himself standing next to the guard by the door of 10 downing street. (oh, for those of you who don't know, 10 downing is famous because it houses the british prime minister). so dad could actually knock on the door if he had a mind too and now nearly 30 years later we can't even get into the street.


this is the back of the houses of parliament and big ben before i got to westminster abbey.



and the abbey is still beautiful. i wasn't in the mood to put up with the crowds inside so didn't go in. i think i'll come back in a winter to avoid too many people.




after this i caught another tube to knightsbridge.



now for some interior shots. mostly from the food halls.









and xmas comes early at harrods. already there is a christmas department. it could be there all year round for all i know, but it is very lovely.


i went all the way to nottinghill, braving the downpour but it got to be too much so i hid in a pub called the prince albert. a burger followed by rhubarb crumble and custard.

now i sit at heathrow airport, over my last starbucks frappacino for a while....sigh.... this'll be the last digital postcard from these lot of holidays. but you never know i might be back to share tidings from perth. afterall, summer is on it's way - the city might just be waking up.

a BIG thankyou to my generous hosts while travelling, julie and vince in los angeles. trish and stuart in west ealing. louise and lorne in chelmsford. whenever i have a home you are more than welcome to kick me out of my bed.

i'll be back!

some of the last days...

a couple of days ago seems so far away now… i don’t want to go back – this is my real life. truly. if i say it long enough maybe it’ll come true. maybe.. :)

anyway, the day i’ll start with was a two days ago for me – a wednesday. i began the day at the national gallery just off trafalgar square.


wasn’t allowed to take any photos inside at all – bah. but i did get to have a look at the rokeby venus by velazquez, van gogh’s sunflowers, some gainsboroughs, a caravaggio and lovely monets (paintings by the way). i do have to say, as lovely as most of them are if i didn’t see one more religious painting i wouldn’t be too sad about it. ha!! but it gave me some other ideas for the kid’s series i’m still working on… blah blah blah. after exiting here i took a few pics of trafalgar.


then a walk through the admiral arches to the mall.






the deckchairs are out in st james park all through the summer and you rent them. i love the idea. mind you, being empty at the moment they just look like an art installation that reminds everyone wistfully of summers past.

and look what gets closer as i move up the mall…





check out the view from the palace – you can see the eye – hadn’t considered that before.



that was all the pictures i took this day. had to tube back to ealing before heading east to liverpool street to catch an overland train to chelmsford. i stayed the night with a glorious friend and her husband, louise and lorne. and i didn’t take any pics. a whole lot of talking and laughing going on. just lovely people.

up at a reasonable time after being smothered by this ginormous doona. i kid you not, it was at least 15cm thick. after another chat with lorne,(louise by this stage had gone off to school - think highschool teacher, not school uniform) who then dropped me off to catch the train back to liverpool street and then to ealing.

even though i really couldn’t afford the time, still so many things to see and do, i had a slack day. had an early lunch in ealing, wandered the shops, bought another book (i’m not quite sure how many i’ve gone through on this trip), and then read some. trish and stuart were leaving work early so we could head up north to a place just out of oxford.

that was a lot of fun as well. went to this estate called woodperry – just beautiful. t&s are friends with steve, the games keeper there – doesn’t that sound old fashioned, and very english, but yes they still do exist. we went for a walk around the property, not too close to the main house though and i do apologise for the sun in one of the shots when i’m at the back of the house.



this is one of the cottages next door – they rent this out in the summer. i much prefer it to the larger one.


the gardens out back.










a lovely meal at the local pub before the hour drive back to london.

p.s. there have been a few bloody cold days and nights here. i wasn't really prepared clothes-wise, but i'm coping. just. so can i stay?

gettin' a bit of culture in

up at out of ealing early today – appointments to keep. lucky that i looked at my printout as i was suppose to be at the british museum at 10am not 10.30 like i thought. oops!

so first the tube into holborn station before a walk through a lovely part of london – bloomsbury. that’s where the writers group got it’s name from, virginia woolf was a member, bit more trivia for you. there’s a small outside mall type street called sicilian avenue – it has roman columns at each end of the block.



from here i walked through the beautiful bloomsbury square to the british museum.





i had found out that the terracotta warrior exhibition was showing so had organised a ticket for myself a few months back. lucky i did as there was a very long line and only certain times later in the day available. i wasn’t able to take any photos, so here’s the next best thing.


hey, i had to be sneaky about that photo as well. :) but the exhibition was pretty impressive – though i would like to see it in it’s own environment – then i’m sure i’d be blown away. just the scale of it all. amazing.

i wandered about the museum a bit – popping my head into the other areas – but i had seen most of it before. one thing i couldn’t resist was returning to the egyptian displays. i found the rosetta stone under glass this time though. when i get my things out of storage i’ll hunt down the photos i took in ’90 (oh, another lifetime ago now). i could actually reach out and touch the stone then.


after the museum i meandered up through russell square – saw some guy practicing his “cocktail” moves with shaker and bottles.




by this time i was getting a bit peckish so decided to move to the other side of the thames to eat because my next appointment was in southwark. it took me some time to get there though… i was waylaid at leicester square.



ended up walking through soho and the theatre district – a great place. all kinds of cool things to see. charing cross road and the plethora of book stores, so many shows to see…





bought a pastry to keep me moving and moving i did.







turned a corner and this building caught my eye.


then suddenly i was in piccadilly circus. it’s smaller than i remembered it. ha!!




crossed the thames and over to the globe theatre. had a ticket to see the merchant of venice. the theatre was built to the same measurements of the original globe, but i tell you they should’ve taken into consideration that our height and girth have changed since then, not to mention our butts. my knees were poking into the back of the guy in front of me. all in all it was a fantastic performance and i loved the interaction of the players with the audience at certain times. a lot of fun was had. (couldn't take pictures during the performance - sorry - had to be there).







the big chimney stack thing is the tate modern. i'll be heading there in the next day or so.