21st in London!
Trip Start
Jan 02, 2009
1
4
55
Trip End
Jan 01, 2010
London, England, United Kingdom
Thursday, January 8, 2009
the hostel is actually very good and a great location. nice brekky but the showers arent the cleanest
well plenty of plans for today but we will see what we actually end up doing
stay posted...
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08 Jan 09
Its actually 09 Jan 09 cause travel pod was temporarily down but heres carries birthday in LONDON!!
well by the time we slept 13 hours and eventually got out it was like 10:30am and we went to HARRODS first, we then walked past the london eye at sunset and decided there wasnt enough light to make it round before dark. we ate our pre packaged food from marks and spencer (love thet grocery store) and we had a cold birthday picnic in the park by the thames. gorgeous sunset ( nothing like australia but still some nice sillhouettes) then we walked over the westminster bridge and looked at the outside of the closed westminster abbey (not too interested) then back to the hostel to get ready for WICKED!! we had dinner at a fake italian restuarant called ASK. not as expensive as i thought, £15. My search for the perfect risotto continues. it was alright but a bit watery not the right sticky consistency, i am holding out high hopes for Italy... we will see.
HARRODS is amazing. 5 floors but my fave is the food floor of course they have a whole room of hand made truffle chocolates in glass casing. I had a coco (coconut one with soft coconut cream stuff in the middle of a harder chocolate casing) and a rice crackle praline thing that the lady suggested (it was the best one) they have krispy kreme inside. As much as I was staying off gluten so that i could eat it now i am so turned off bread i cant bring myself to eat it as much as Carrie encourages me to. :P
Carrie said she has never seen such a high concentration of rich people! I saw a champagne with 22ct totally edible gold flakes inside!!!! WTF these people are running out of ways to waste thier money they have to EAT IT!!!!! :)
Carrie and I are becoming pros at the metro
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Friday the 9th Jan
quickly what we did
leicester square web cam where mum could see us live. buckingham palace too cold to care. globe theatre had to buy a tour to get in but very interesting i would love to see a show but only on in the summer. rushed to london eye but closed. Victoria and Albert museum. then we visited the lovely murray and davina who fed us the best risotto i have had so far. i dont know if a restuarant can beat it. so nice chatting with them and they also gave us plenty of local knowledge around london. we have walked so close to so many things and missed them. There is a BORDERS in London!!! woot! going there i only wish i had longer but USA ... also want to sit and sketch statues in the louvre.
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Saturday 9th Jan 09
well we didnt get out of the hotel till 10.30. thats a half an hour improvement on most mornings. i forgot the directions to eddie hypolites church and we didnt have enough time to get there before most of it would be over. eddie isnt the pastor there anymore.
leicester square again. I was very dissapointed to hear that hairspray and billy elliot are sold out
the weekends are more than double the crowds of the weekdays. it must be local united kingdom people who come to the city to shop on the weekends. ALSO found out that most London shows dont show on Sunday. so stupid it should be monday. Twelfth Night should have a matinee tomorrow but i have to line up at 11am to get one of the standing spots for 10 pounds.
anyhoo carrie and i found cheap lion king tickets for tonight so stoked!!!. soooo cold.
it actually snowed a tiny tiny bit in the city. if its going to be this cold it may as well snow as i always say. Then we went to trafalger square where the fountain is frozen over. we wondered into the national gallery and saw some nice old renaissance and older paintings that all look the same but then to my surprise... BAM theres monets japanese bridge and water lillies. also van goghs sunflowers and cezanne and renoir!! pretty cool A big TICK off my list of famour paintings to see live. Now looking forward to the musee d Orsay. although i thought the water lillies would be there anyhoo...
then to the national portrait gallery that was alright. we made our way down piccidilly road very cute. and into fortnam and masons, since 1700s crazy old and rich. looked at the chocolate truffle for me and the notebooks for Carrie. Then we had to rush off to BORDERS which we were heading towards for a while.
now im back at the hostel waiting to go see LION KING WOOT!
I will have only seen 2 shows and both i have already seen but im with Carrie and she hasnt seen them. its all good i can see more in New York and I will probably be there by myself.
Just saw Lion King great music and puppetry as usual. Carrie and I are so spastic we were running late to this one as well as Wicked the other night. I say running cause we literally ran so much. then i had the smart idea to bypass the huge line for the crowded lift out of the metro by taking the stairs. the 198 steps!! anyhoo great excercise if nothing else. we defs took longer than the lift even though we ran up. Carrie asked a guy with a bike for directions and he said he could take us for 2.50p so since we had just ran up stairs and didnt know the way it was a nice ride. like a european took took with plastic to keep out the wind. quite nice and warm.
We think we have seen eveything we want to see so tommorrow is sleeping in day. YEAH!!!
