Ten Days in London: February 2023

 

Me in a Pub with a Pint!

Late in 2022, Janet was trolling around the United Airlines site and blurted out, "hey, flights to London have really come down...you want to go to London in March?"

London is neck and neck as my favorite with Paris and Munich, so I said, "Sure!" and over the second cup of coffee, we had the flight, an AirBnB right by Covent Garden and Chinatown and close to five different Tube stations...all booked that morning!  Later Janet scored London Theater tickets as well, amazed by the much lower prices than NYC/Broadway.

On February 7, 2023 we took the usual non-stop from SFO to Heathrow, a nice and uneventful flight, and we did a bit of walking to get to the Heathrow Express (on an English Pound per kilometer basis, it's the most expensive train ride in the UK...such as the price for convenience) but the 17 minute trip puts you in to Paddington Station and then we Uber'd to our AirBnB.

Oy, as we spied our location: we rented it based on the wonderfully central location, with the listing saying "some stairs"...but they left out the FOUR flights of narrow stairs to get up to the room, right above a KFC!  OMG, we're going to be smelling grease the whole time...ugh.  And the stairs were so narrow (did I mention there was no lift) and our bags were rather heavy for a ten-day trip in winter, that we unpacked half our bags and took two trips up to our apartment.  I am glad we had those packing cubes as we could offload the cubes and carry our then much lighter luggage up the stairs, then climb up with the packing cubes.  Two trips up and our greasy fears were for naught as you couldn't smell the KFC fryers at all, and the bedroom was on the back part of the apartment so you never heard any street noise.

Our apartment wa on the top floor, right above the KFC

The street view, right outside our door to the right

London's Chinatown decorated for the Lunar New Year!

By 5pm we were settled in and we went out to check out the neighborhood and we ended up getting dinner at the Salisbury Pub: I had steak and ale pie with a room temp pale ale and Janet had fish and chips.  We were back by 10; it was a three melatonin night, 2 at 10 and 1 more at 1:30, but we both slept soundly, me up by 7am, Janet by 8:30.  We find that we try to get as much sleep on the flight over, and we force ourselves to hit the ground running once you get there, with NO NAPS, so you are good and exhausted that first day, and a good night's sleep that first night sets our clocks to the new time quickly.  NO NAPS!  I'm serious...none...keep moving and get as much sunlight as you can.

Day 1: We had crumpets and coffee in the room, then set out in light rain to the National Gallery where I got to see my favorite J.M.W. Turner, The Fighting Temeraire

As with my usual museum pattern, we spent a good chunk of time in the National Gallery, but a wing was closed, so we'll just have to come back soon!  We spent the rest of the day exploring Chinatown and Covent Garden, Janet getting some tea at the Mariage Freres tea shop and we had some sit down schnacks there in their little tea room.  We scored a slightly fast-foodie dinner in the neighborhood and planned to get to the British Museum first thing the next day.

Day 2: we walked up to the British Museum first thing which still had a pretty healthy line by the time we got up there...it was only a kilometer walk from the apartment--I told you we were centrally located, as the National Gallery was just as close going the opposite direction.  We hit all the usual sights, focusing this trip on the Egyptian wing and the Chinese porcelain collections.  We had high-tea in the restaurant 

You can't get any Higher Tea than that at the British Museum!

Filled with fancy British carbs, we took the Tube down to the Theater District to see Hamilton, a much easier (and cheaper0 ticket to get in London than New York (or San Francisco if it was there).  After Hamilton, we made our way back to Chinatown and had dinner at the Feng Shui Inn.

Day 3: we got a late start due to the late night with Hamilton, so we took the Tube to the Victoria and Albert Museum as I had tickets for a performance at the Albert Hall (real close to the V&A) that night.  Janet had scored the theater tickets for the trip, and I wanted to see Royal Albert Hall, and rather than just get a tourist tour of the place, I checked out what concerts were there.  What I scored were two tickets to the "Mountbatten Festival of Music" with massed bands of His Royal Majesty's Royal Marines.  I was giddy with anticipation!

I don't remember ever going to the V&A; I think Janet went years ago for a fashion exhibit.  I was astounded by the collection, and we only got to see about two-thirds of the museum, but not after having lunch in the William Morris dining room!  We decided we'd come back to the V&A later in the trip, and after the museum, we had some dinner near the South Kensington Tube station, then made our way to the Albert Hall.  

As we went up to our seats, we were asked by the usher if we wanted to switch our seats to the opposite side so "we could see the Royals who were rumored to be attending.  Which Royals?  We can't say, but you can go over to the other side to have a view into the Royal Box."  We politely declined, but as the festivities got started, the crowd en mass turned to the Royal Box, just below the level where we were sitting in the nosebleed seats, and launched in to "God Save the King" while gazing at the recently crowned King Charles!  Wow...very cool...those Brits love their Royals!

We got enough of a view of him from the Jumbotron, then the "massed bands" performed their martial music assisted by the Royal Netherlands Marine Band.  We were intrigued by the drummers holding their sticks up at their noses like a mustache whenever they paused their playing.  At the intermission we talked with a lovely older British couple.  They were Tories, but they hated Boris Johnson; they have friends in South Carolina that are Trumpers, but we agreed in our hate for him.  It was a fantastic evening; the massed bands were very impressive and certainly Bucket List worthy!

The William Morris Dining Room

In the V&A

The Royal Albert Hall, before the bands got cranking

Day 4: This turned out to be a high-mileage day: we started first thing searching for dim sum, in Chinatown, and they don't do it like here as we only found one place open before noon that served something approaching dim sum...lesson learned.  From there we walked in to SoHo and Carnaby Street as Janet wanted to go to the anchor store for Liberty House, after which we scored some coffee and snacks at a Lavazza store and walked to Regent Street to a Fortnum and Mason, returning to the apartment in the later afternoon.  That night we had tickets to a St. Martin in the Fields concert of Bach and Handel.  We've done this before, hence our desire to do it again!  We had a late dinner at Punjab on Neal Street where Janet had eaten before on a business trip.

Day 5: We took a long Uber ride from the apartment out to Greenwich Park, starting up the hill at the Royal Observatory with the obligatory straddling of the Prime Meridian, then down the hill to the Queens House and then to the Maritime museum.  Another Turner is prominently displayed, "The Battle of Trafalgar." as well as a large Figurehead collection.

A unique sundial with the gap between their tails indicating the time

The wall of ship figureheads

The Queen's House

I've been to the Cutty Sark previously, so we skipped it on the way to Greenwich Village where we slipped in to the Two Admirals Hardy Pub where Six Nations Rugby Tourney was on the telly (IRL vs Scotland, with Ireland winning 22-7).  We were surprised to see Uber-branded boats on the Thames, and we took one back to the Embankment and after a full day at Greenwich, we finished it off with Punjab leftovers in the apartment.

Day 6L we took the train up to Colindale and the short walk up to the RAF Museum--wow, what a collection!  I was in heaven, spending most of the day here.

A B-24 raised from waters in Norway, under restoration

A B-24 repurposed for the Indian Air Force

And an Avro Lancaster heavy bomber

After returning to London, we dined at the Lamb and Flag Pub, the "oldest pub in London."  We were getting in the flow of eating at pubs, where there generally isn't any table service, and you order at the bar then sit down in whatever table is available.

Day 7, which was Day 2 at the V&A.  I ran out to the Paul restaurant that Karen and I frequented when we stayed on Maiden Lane, but after I picked out lovely pastries to take up the apartment for brekkies, they only took cards and I only had cash...so disappointing!  

Tipu's Tiger, a functional instrument that chomps on the Englishman

I found this to be the most fascinating (huge) gallery in the V&A, as it is mostly filled with perfect copies of classic artworks commissioned from various Euro-Royals wanting some of that Michaelangelo if I can't have the original.  Of course, we had to make a return to the dining room and had two excellent scones to cap our day at the V&A.  From the V&A we made our way to Harrod's for a quick shopping spin, then we ended up at the Bunch of Grapes pub for dinner, where Janet had mussels, I had a steak with "London Glory Craft Ale" and surprisingly, my first (and only) Stickey Toffee Pudding of the trip!

My absolute favorite dessert: STP!

As we were going to the theater the next night, we somehow chatted up two American women from Connecticut who were on their annual "London Theater" trip, where they find it's much cheaper to fly to London and see its shows rather than pay Broadway prices.  They are spending one week, seeing EIGHT shows (a matinee is in there somewhere), and they do it every year.

Day 8: the Tube was on strike but the Uber Boats were not so we caught one and toured the Borough Market, sharing a paella from a vendor there and having a "salted beef" sandwich later.  We then toured the HMS Belfast moored in the Thames.  That night, Janet had tickets to "Six" which is a modern interpretation of the six wives of Henry VIII, but oddly there was no Henry.  I kept waiting, but he never appeared!

The HMS Belfast

Before I leave this trip, I must say something about the Euro-appliances.  In both the AirBnB I rented with Karen on Maiden Lane, London, in 2015 and on this trip, the "combination clothes washer/dryer" that was in both apartments.  In both cases, we attempted to wash and dry a load of clothes, and the single appliance that supposedly washed and dried the clothes seemed to wash them credibly, but the drying function failed miserably.  We left a message for the "host" on this trip, and he sent someone to "fix it" but when we switched the now-wet load of clothes to dry, the appliance stayed in wash mode, getting the clothes all wet again.  And in the Maiden Lane place, the dryer function worked, it just never really dried the clothes, even after several dry cycles.  Complete bollucks!

My notes end there, so I can only assume we left the next day and returned home on an uneventful flight out of Heathrow back to SFO.