So my trip to London didn't go exactly as planned, but I had the most amazing time!
When I got to London on Friday it was already dark. I mean it was 4:30 in the afternoon so why shouldn't it look like 9:00 at night? I knew I was going to be on my own for at least the first night so I made sure the hostel I was booked was close to the Victoria Coach Station. It ended up just being down the street so after checking in I decided to walk down to the London Eye. By the time I got across the bridge I was starving so I stopped to eat at this Japanese restaurant. I haven't had Japanese food in such a long time and it was delicious. They gave me way more food than I could possibly eat so I just sat there for a while trying to digest it all before heading back out into the night.
I was quite surprised that it wasn't colder. When I was there in October it was unbearably cold and windy at night, but this night it was quite lovely. Since it was so nice I saw no point in heading back to the hostel yet. I decided to walk along the South Bank of the Thames towards The Globe. I hadn't been there yet and I thought now would be a good time. I wasn't going to pay to go inside, and I can see the outside at anytime so now seemed good. Many of the buildings were lit up in colors along the river and there were tons of Christmas lights up. Right next to the London Eye there was this cool Christmas market. The stands/stalls all had wooden paneling so they looked pretty legit. There were sweets, mulled wine, crafts, and even churros! It was all very Christmas-y. Oh, and there was a carousel! After exploring that for bit I finally made it down to The Globe and realized it was nothing special. Thankfully it was a nice walk.
On the way back I just sat on one of the benches and admired the beauty of London at night. This guy sat next to me and we ended up talking for easily over an hour. He lives near Camden but is originally from Belfast. We just talked about all sorts of things. He was kind of one of those guys who thinks he knows just so much and is so wise, but he was kind enough that I just overlooked it for the night.
Before I headed back to the hostel I got to listen to this guy play probably one of the saddest songs ever...Tears in Heaven by Eric Clapton. That song was always sad but once my dad told me specifically what it was written about it just became heartbreaking. I won't tell you why (I don't what to be responsible for your sadness), but if you look it up all I can say is you were warned!
The next day I was supposed to meet up with Maile. I went to Camp Juliette Low with her, but I haven't seen her for three or four years. We were communicating via Facebook so I knew there could be issues. We had a tentative meeting place when I left: noon at Parliament. Unfortunately the internet was down in the hostel so I wasn't aware that the meeting place had changed. I ended up waiting at Parliament for thirty minutes before I realized something must have changed. Poor Maile must have ended up waiting at the Tower of London. It was disappointing, but I didn't let it spoil my trip.
I walked up to the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square. I get bored by religious realist paintings, which most of them are, so I headed straight to the two rooms housing the impressionism paintings. I got to admire Monet's "Water Lilies, Setting Sun" and Van Gogh's "A Wheatfield with Cypresses: and "Sunflowers". I'm not going to lie, I looked for Amy's name in the latter but to no avail. It didn't take long to admire the paintings in those two rooms so I headed outside and got to enjoy the rehearsal of the Christmas tunes that were to be sung on the steps later that night. I had every intention of making it back for the formal performance, but it just did not happen.
I decided it was a museum kind of day so attempted to make my way to the British Museum near Covenant Gardens. I started off by taking a wrong turn and ended up having lunch at Tortilla. I finally got tacos and they were delicious. I just wish I could have had some queso. The British just don't seem to understand my desire to eat a bowl of melted cheese with tortilla chips. After lunch I took a couple more wrong turns and ended up in the Seven Dials area. It was such a cool Soho type area with tons of shopping. I found this store called Forbidden Planet and fell in love. It is sci-fi/geek paradise. It is filled with comics and TV and movie memorabilia. If I had had more money I would have bought a truckload of stuff. There was a whole section for Doctor Who and The Big Bang Theory and Marvel superheroes. They also had all of season 8 of the Buffy comics, the Buffy omnibuses, the Angel comics, and the Angel & Faith comics. I could have bought a lifetime of gifts for Sam in that store and he must visit it whenever he returns to London.
Finally I made it to my original destination, the British Museum. The place is gigantic. I don't know how but I managed to walk through every room. I was there until it closed at 5:30. Honestly the trick is to not do much reading. If you try to read everything you will be exhausted after the first room. They had a marvelously depressing bunch of rooms on Egyptian burials, a fascinating room on the history of clocks, a room on tea in China and Japan, and a plethora of rooms on the history of the rest of the world. The combination of walking to the British Museum and throughout the museum resulted in some very pained feet.
However, the walking did not stop there. I decided to walk back to Trafalgar Square to see the Christmas concert. Unfortunately I was distracted again when I passed St. Martin's Theatre. They were showing Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap so I decided to catch a show. I must say the seats in the uppermost section were definitely not made for even average sized people. I'm short and even I felt cramped in those tiny rows. There was hardly any leg room at all. However, the show was a beautiful "who dunnit". I did keep expecting a giant bee to appear, but no luck. Clearly Doctor Who has severely altered my view of Agatha Christie mysteries. After that I tried to catch the Christmas market, but it was much too late and all the stalls were closed down so I caught a bus back to the hostel and crashed.
So there was no Maile, but it was a big confidence boost travelling by myself throughout London. Clearly I can do this.
When I got to London on Friday it was already dark. I mean it was 4:30 in the afternoon so why shouldn't it look like 9:00 at night? I knew I was going to be on my own for at least the first night so I made sure the hostel I was booked was close to the Victoria Coach Station. It ended up just being down the street so after checking in I decided to walk down to the London Eye. By the time I got across the bridge I was starving so I stopped to eat at this Japanese restaurant. I haven't had Japanese food in such a long time and it was delicious. They gave me way more food than I could possibly eat so I just sat there for a while trying to digest it all before heading back out into the night.
On the way back I just sat on one of the benches and admired the beauty of London at night. This guy sat next to me and we ended up talking for easily over an hour. He lives near Camden but is originally from Belfast. We just talked about all sorts of things. He was kind of one of those guys who thinks he knows just so much and is so wise, but he was kind enough that I just overlooked it for the night.
Before I headed back to the hostel I got to listen to this guy play probably one of the saddest songs ever...Tears in Heaven by Eric Clapton. That song was always sad but once my dad told me specifically what it was written about it just became heartbreaking. I won't tell you why (I don't what to be responsible for your sadness), but if you look it up all I can say is you were warned!
The next day I was supposed to meet up with Maile. I went to Camp Juliette Low with her, but I haven't seen her for three or four years. We were communicating via Facebook so I knew there could be issues. We had a tentative meeting place when I left: noon at Parliament. Unfortunately the internet was down in the hostel so I wasn't aware that the meeting place had changed. I ended up waiting at Parliament for thirty minutes before I realized something must have changed. Poor Maile must have ended up waiting at the Tower of London. It was disappointing, but I didn't let it spoil my trip.
I walked up to the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square. I get bored by religious realist paintings, which most of them are, so I headed straight to the two rooms housing the impressionism paintings. I got to admire Monet's "Water Lilies, Setting Sun" and Van Gogh's "A Wheatfield with Cypresses: and "Sunflowers". I'm not going to lie, I looked for Amy's name in the latter but to no avail. It didn't take long to admire the paintings in those two rooms so I headed outside and got to enjoy the rehearsal of the Christmas tunes that were to be sung on the steps later that night. I had every intention of making it back for the formal performance, but it just did not happen.
I decided it was a museum kind of day so attempted to make my way to the British Museum near Covenant Gardens. I started off by taking a wrong turn and ended up having lunch at Tortilla. I finally got tacos and they were delicious. I just wish I could have had some queso. The British just don't seem to understand my desire to eat a bowl of melted cheese with tortilla chips. After lunch I took a couple more wrong turns and ended up in the Seven Dials area. It was such a cool Soho type area with tons of shopping. I found this store called Forbidden Planet and fell in love. It is sci-fi/geek paradise. It is filled with comics and TV and movie memorabilia. If I had had more money I would have bought a truckload of stuff. There was a whole section for Doctor Who and The Big Bang Theory and Marvel superheroes. They also had all of season 8 of the Buffy comics, the Buffy omnibuses, the Angel comics, and the Angel & Faith comics. I could have bought a lifetime of gifts for Sam in that store and he must visit it whenever he returns to London.
Finally I made it to my original destination, the British Museum. The place is gigantic. I don't know how but I managed to walk through every room. I was there until it closed at 5:30. Honestly the trick is to not do much reading. If you try to read everything you will be exhausted after the first room. They had a marvelously depressing bunch of rooms on Egyptian burials, a fascinating room on the history of clocks, a room on tea in China and Japan, and a plethora of rooms on the history of the rest of the world. The combination of walking to the British Museum and throughout the museum resulted in some very pained feet.So there was no Maile, but it was a big confidence boost travelling by myself throughout London. Clearly I can do this.
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