Mr Hoot

By now you all know about the problems I had in England and my subsequent return to Australia.

So what now? Well I have decided to take a road trip. I haven’t planned too much except that I will be off on Tuesday next (25th March) driving towards Queensland. I ‘m not sure where I’ll end up or how long I will be. To this end I have had the car serviced and made a few purchases:

RACV Membership
Sigma 18-200mm f3.5-6.3 DC OC lens
72mm filter to suit above lens
Tom Tom GPS
New road map
New Rockport shoes

I will try and keep in touch via email and/or mobile phone.

Today my feet had a rest.  I bought a ticket on one of those open-top double-decker buses.  I jumped on right outside the hotel and sat down inside.  I sat inside because it was very cold; cold but again, clear.  I must say that the weather has been great so far.  Only some rain on the day that I arrived and then cold clear days with only the occasional cloudy period.

We went on a long roundabout route and there was a recorded commentary.  The ‘Original Tour’ company runs six routes and you can change routes where they cross each other.  I ended up at St Paul’s again because I wanted to have a look at the Museum of London which is nearby.  The museum is very interesting, tracing the history of London from way back in the stone age, through the Roman period, Saxons, etc.  There is also an interesting  display on the Great Fire of London.

After the Museum I caught another of the buses to the Tower of London.  The price of the ticket also includes river travel from the Tower of London, Greenwich or Westminster.  The cruise boat took me to Greenwich where I had a look at the meridian line where the western and eastern hemispheres meet.  I walked around the Maritime Museum as well.  This is housed in buildings that used to be the Naval Academy.

Then it was back on the river cruise up the Thames until I got to Westminster.  I sat on the top of the boat and it was still cold.  The Thames was muddy but it wasn’t smelly like it was when Michael and Justine visited last September.

Then I walked to Trafalgar Square where I caught the bus again back to the hotel.  My feet were not aching when I got back for once.

Tomorrow is my last full day on London so I think I will use it to see all the odds and ends that I have missed during this week.  It looks like I won’t be able to get to see the terracotta warriors at the British Museum but it wasn’t that high on my list of things to do.  Hopefully the weather will hold.

The day dawned clear and cold. Last night’s gloomy weather forecast hadn’t eventuated. My feet were behaving better and actually did as they were told most of the time (my left foot tried to scamper off once or twice and I had to give it a stern talking to). After I had breakfast, I jumped on a Tube from Russell Square to South Kensington. Once I had mastered the intricacies of the OysterCard, everything went smoothly.

Nothing in Britain seems to open until 10am so I went for a walk to Kensington Gardens for an hour. By this time dark clouds had gathered in the sky and the wind got a bit colder. I wasn’t too impressed with this park but was interested to have a look at the Peter Pan statue. I returned to the Albert Memorial where a bus-load of Japanese tourists were all taking photos of each other.

I visited the Natural History Museum first. This was always my favourite. The building itself is amazing let alone the collection inside. The dinosaur display was fantastic. The blue whale display is always impressive but someone should really dust the thing! I also took a photo of a Dodo as I promised John at work I would.

Next was the Victoria and Albert Museum. I had never visited it before and probably won’t again – it’s just not my bag. Weather was better again with the grey clouds passing over.

Then the Science museum. I loved the space stuff and all the steam engines. It was supposed to be a day where I didn’t do too much walking but there’s a lot of walking to do around the galleries in museums.

Back on the Tube I decided to stop off at Piccadilly to see Eros. When I got there, it dawned on me that Regent Street ran off the Circus, so I set off for Hamley’s Toys Shop. I bought a double decker bus for Matthew (don’t tell him!). Then back to the hotel.

Had a nice curry for dinner at a restaurant almost next door.

Perhaps tomorrow I will have a non-walking day!

My feet have done it again. They have led me a merry chase all over London once more. It was cold but clear this morning, the sky a lovely blue.

I started off walking to St Paul’s Cathedral, stopping on the way to have breakfast at a café. Pretty much the same as yesterday but without the baked beans.

I stopped as I passed over Holburn Viaduct to take a picture of the street where Dad used to work – Plumtree Court.

St Paul’s is expensive – £10 to get in. But in I went. It’s a fantastic place, the interior of the dome is richly painted with religious pictures. The Duke of Wellington and Nelson are buried in the crypt in huge ornate tombs.

Next was the Monument. This is in Pudding Lane and commemorates where the Great Fire of London started. It was covered in scaffolding from top to bottom. Oh well, I would probably paid an entrance fee, climbed up it and then been scared of the height of it.

From there my feet took off in the direction of the Tower of London. One of the Yeoman of the Guard took us on a guided tour. He was quite funny – not that I can remember any of the witty lines he said. I had a good look at the armories and the Crown Jewels. The ravens were bouncing around on the lawn but didn’t come near enough for a good close up. It was quite busy there with lots of school groups from all over Europe or so it sounded.

By this time my feet were really sore so I caught a taxi back to the British Museum and then proceeded to walk around the displays there – this, of course, made my feet even sorer. I especially liked the early British, Roman and Egyptian displays. Some of the early craftsmanship is exquisite. I stuck my 50mm lens on the camera and took about 50 available light photos. Some of these have a lot of glass reflections on them which I couldn’t seem to avoid.

Then it was back to the hotel again to rest my poor weary feet. The weather forecast is for COLD tomorrow with possible ice, sleet and maybe a fluttering of snow. It might be time to have a look at the Natural History Museum, Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum – they are all close together.

And thanks to Michael for getting the global roaming problem with my phone all fixed up!

London pavements must be harder than Australian ones. They must be because I have a blister on my left foot. Never had a blister in Australia.

I started out today with the intention of walking to Covent Garden to have a good cooked breakfast. Trouble was that nowhere is open at 7:30 in the morning. Covent Garden was pretty much deserted, so I took a few pictures and wandered off. I spent the day wandering, just wandering where my feet would take me.

I found breakfast in a little café in The Strand. Bacon, egg, sausage, mushrooms, tomato, baked beans, toast and tea for £4.50. It was delicious! Then I strolled along to Trafalgar Square. There were a few more people about and the bells on St Martins were ringing. I intended to go and have a look at the National Gallery but my feet had other ideas.

They took me through Admiralty Arch and a short way along The Mall. I turned off into St James Park. I have found that I am addicted to photographing grey squirrels – they are just so cute! And there was the famous St James pelicans and lots more ducky things for me to take pictures of too.

I ended up at Buckingham Palace and remained there for the changing of the guard. Not that I saw the actual change. It’s Mother’s Day here in Britain today and there were crowds of people walking around in the sunshine – yes it was almost warm today! At least I saw the Household Cavalry and those ones with the dead bears on their heads.

From the Palace I wandered back through St James Park and so to the River Thames. I followed the river along the Embankment. From there I turned back towards Covent Garden again just near Waterloo Bridge. Now Covent Garden was filled with people. There were many stalls and many street performers. One of today’s highlights was seeing a Chelsea Pensioner – I asked if I could take his photo and he agreed. This was the first time I had seen one of these guys – and I thanked him and shook his hand.

Then back to the hotel at about 3pm. My feet were just so tired! After an hour or so, I went for another walk down to the British Museum. It was very busy there on a Sunday afternoon, so I only popped my head in. Went to a second-hand bookshop just across the road that Michael & Justine had told me about, didn’t buy anything though.

I had dinner in an Italian restaurant. Penne pasta with grilled chicken, sun-dried tomatoes, mushrooms and a touch of basil and garlic. Yummy! I even had a glass of white wine with it.

And when I returned to the hotel, David Attenborough was on the TV with his new (and last) series: Life in Cold Blood. What more could I ask for?

This post has been brought to you by London A-Z, without which I would have been lost.

Awoke early. Weather was clear but quite windy. Had continental breakfast at the hotel, and a cup of tea with real milk in it. Then I was off walking through London. It was cold! When I was out of the wind it wasn’t too bad but the wind was blooming freezing! I had on a t-shirt, long-sleeved shirt, windcheater, parka and scarf and at times was still chilly.

The streets weren’t very busy at 7:30 as I made my way to Regents Park. In the park there was a small number of joggers and dog-walkers. There were formal English gardens here with rows of clipped trees and hedges, lawns and fountains. A host of golden daffodils waved in the wind and crocuses poked their little flowers through the grass. Birds were singing and the sun was shining – it was beautiful!

I was much too early to visit the zoo so I just wandered. Regents Park is huge and, as well as the formal gardens, contains large playing fields, a lake and many paths through it in all in different directions. The trees were mostly bare but there was early blossom and a faint tinge of green on some where small buds were starting to show.

I joined the small crowd waiting to enter London Zoo at about 9:55. It cost £14:50 to enter. I still like London Zoo; it’s small by most standards but filled with charming displays. Some of the cages are quite old with a lot of wire but they are changing that all the time. My favourite exhibits were walk-through ones where small monkeys were kept but there were no cages – the monkeys just climbed around ignoring people as you walked by them. By midday, the wind had eased a little and I bought some pasta salad for lunch. Food prices at the zoo were inflated just like Melbourne Zoo – £3.40 for a hot dog? No thanks!

I strolled back to the hotel with sore feet but satisfied that I had a great day. Bought myself a bird-book at Watersons’s Books. Uploaded all my pics to the computer. There are some good ones there I think, and I will try and get them on Flickr if I can.

What a long flight it is from Melbourne to London. I didn’t have time either in Singapore or Dubai to look for a lens so I am going to have to make do with what I’ve got.

Melbourne – Singapore – Dubai was pretty boring. On my right was an Italian woman with a very pointy elbow that she kept sticking into the softer parts of my anatomy. She didn’t appear to notice this. The other side was a nice Scottish lassie by the name of Dawn. She had been visiting her sister in East Brighton and was on her way home after 3 months. She loved Australia and was hoping to migrate very soon. When we said goodbye at Dubai she gave me a hug which surprised the hell out of me but it was nice all the same.

Dubai airport is large and modern but it only had 2 lanes to go through a security check. There was a large crowd of restless people all milling around trying to get through. This used up my lens shopping time of about 40 minutes – by the time I was through, they were boarding Flight EK 001 to London.

We sat in the plane for a long while until the captain informed us all that there had been a cock-up (his words) with the cargo and that they had to unload some. So we sat there for an hour or so until we could taxi out to take-off position. We sat there a while and then returned to the terminal! Apparently someone’s luggage was on the plane but they were not. It took another two hours to locate the luggage in the cargo hold by which time I had a raging headache. One of the flight crew gave me a couple of Panadol and after a half hour sleep I was fine again. I did get to watch a lot of in-flight movies though: Mr Thingies Magical Emporium, Ratatoullie, Hairspray, Starlight (or stardust – something like that).

After a another 7 hours or so, we arrived in London. I had great views of the city from the air. Just as we landed it started to rain. Passport control and luggage pick-up didn’t take too long. Then I wandered around asking people at various information desks where to get my Dot2Dot shuttle bus from. I walked a couple of miles looking for the damned thing until I asked a guy who actually knew where I should go and didn’t just have a random guess like the others.

Eventually arrived at the hotel. It’s not bad. I even have an en-suite with a reasonable shower. Not large but certainly much better than the crudpit I stayed in last time. I am on the top floor (7th) but not much of a view. I can see the London Eye, British Museum, London University and the Post Office Tower if I lean in the appropriate direction. I went for a quick walk just around Russell Square; it was getting dark and felt cold – about 7 degrees. It’s quite windy as I write this at about 2 am – can’t sleep, body clock needs an adjustment. I haven’t taken a single photo yet!

More soon…