Up early as I am heading into London today. I have to be honest, it was weird being at the Farnham house without Olly and Pat. I walked to the train station, then caught the 9.30am train into London, and arrived at my accommodation in Earls Court (got a good deal, not staying here as it is a traditional Aussie hangout!) at about 11.00am. I couldn’t check in, it was too early, but had pre-arranged leaving my bag at the hotel whilst I spent the day out site seeing.
I made my way to St John’s Wood, and walked for 10 min to Lords. I have decided to do the Lords tour, and there are 3 options, one at 10am, noon and 2pm. I arrived to find that there is a match on between Derbyshire and Middlesex so we might not be able to go into the Long Room. I have other places to visit but didn't know if I would get out to Lords again and really wanted to do the tour so took the risk.
We had a good guide, Graeme, who really knows his cricket. He took us around the various stands, and then into the media centre (during the lunch break). It is an amazing view of the Lords ground and although I still think the media pod is ugly, I got more appreciation for it because of the amazing view. Whilst in another grand stand the cricket game came to a conclusion, so fortunately, we could go into the Long Room, see the Ashes and also see the ‘real’ tennis court (cross between tennis and squash). There was only 15 of us on the tour so it was a great opportunity to hear the stories and absorb the atmosphere in a small group. There is so much pomp and ceremony at Lords – did you know that people can’t be proposed as members of the Marylebone Cricket Club unless they are over the age of 16 and one guy has hit a cricket ball all the way over the pavilion (his last name is Trott)!!
After the tour I grabbed something to eat then headed into Charing Cross. It is a gorgeous day, brilliant sunshine and about 28c. At Trafalgar Square there were hoards of people, many dipping their feet in the fountain to cool down.
I made my way to go to the National Portrait Gallery – they had an exhibition on that I wanted to see, called “Glamour of the Gods”, whereby there were amazing photos of Hollywood stars from the 1920s to 1960s including Greta Garbo, Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn and James Dean. The exhibition was fantastic, but so were the other works in the gallery, including the nominees and winners of the BP Portrait Award for 2011. I must’ve spent about 3 hours wandering around and still did not see everything. By this stage my feet were pleading for a rest, so I headed back to the hotel.
I had learnt a couple of days before hand that a person I use to work with was in London at the same time as me. As luck would have it, Marianne was staying in the next suburb so we met up for dinner. I got a recommendation for a local pub with a beer garden, so we made our way there and spent the next couple of hours talking travel and life whilst having a meal and a couple of Bulmers. It is such a mild night, perfect to be out. It is so strange catching up with someone you know from Australia – and it felt as if we were back home, just people spoke with a different accent and we paid for the meal and drinks with pounds.
I’m tired as have had a big day on my feet so it was a fairly early night. TV keeps playing replays of England beating India in the test...they played well, and deserved the win.
No comments:
Post a Comment