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Published: August 16th 2006
Our Favorite Club and Restaurant Next Door
In Soho. Total sausage fest, but the damn locals in the club were so friendly. They kept buying me drinks all night!Given all the media crap that has been going on in London over the past week, it’s a blessing to be able to say that my visit to London was undeterred. Overall, I really enjoyed London, but the visit has helped me to realize that when it comes to international travel it’s the extreme differences that I enjoy most. At times, I simply didn’t feel like I had left the United States while in London. As crazy and simple as it sounds, it just didn’t feel very new to me. Of course, all of this makes complete sense when you think about the obvious English influences in the United States. I suppose my expectations may have been a bit lofty. In summary, despite all of the pleasure I got out of my time in London, I really have a feeling that my memories of London won’t be as long-lasting as compared to other destinations in my traveling adventures.
Sunday afternoon we arrived in London at Paddington Station. From there we hopped on the Tube headed for the hotel. We stayed at City View Hotel. The hotel was located literally steps from the
Bethnal Green Tube stop. This turned out to be a huge convenience as about 90% of our travel was done through the Tube. The hotel accommodations pretty much measured up to the cost. Small, moderately clean rooms. All of this was fine and dandy so long as you could handle the loud trains passing by throughout the day. Apparently our room’s window faced a train track, so about 2-3 times an hour a train would go racing by causing some serious noise disturbance as well as a mild tremor to boot. The first time this happened I couldn’t stop laughing at Lei since she owned the blame for booking the room. So our stay at City View Hotel became a constant struggle between a stuffy, warm room at night, or a cooled, extremely loud sleeping arrangement with the window open. To be fair, I can’t think of a time where the passing trains actually woke me up.
I found the London Tube to be very easy to navigate. As long as you understood your north, south, east, and west, you were in pretty good shape for not getting lost. The more interesting part of the London Tube has got
London
As seen from the top of St. Paul's Cathedral to be the musicians setup inside the stations playing for spare change. I expected to see this out in the streets, but not particularly in the stations. It was always nice to be heading down an escalator while being greeted by some musician’s song echoing up from the station down below. Even stranger was the guy who whipped out a flute on our train, blasted out a song or two, and then walked around with a plastic bag asking for change right before exiting at his intended stop. Talk about making the most out of your daily commute!
After we got comfortable with the hotel, we headed out Sunday night to some of the social centers within London. Our stops included Covenant Garden, Leicester Square, Piccadilly Circus, Soho, and Trafalgar Square. Each was in walking distance of the other, so it was real easy to explore without getting too far from the action. Surprisingly, each area had a slightly different feel to it as compared to the others. I suppose I enjoyed Covenant Garden the most. It had a bit of a town square feel with various street performers working the crowds over for some spare change. We also
St. Paul's Cathedral
No photos inside, so... looked into picking up a couple tickets to the Broadway show Avenue Q (think South Park, with Sesame Street puppets), but the tickets were much harder to come by then we were willing to pay.
Monday started off with a trip to St. Paul’s Cathedral. I don’t think it would be a great leap for me to say that St. Paul’s Cathedral is the nicest Cathedral I’ve ever set foot in. Extravagantly decorated, visually it’s really too much to take in with just a brief visit. We spent almost two hours in St Paul’s, which included a climb to the top of the outer dome for one of the best views of London (The London Eye possibly being better). The 530-step climb reminded me of how badly I need to get back in shape! The American Memorial Chapel was of obvious interest to me, honoring those Americans who gave their lives in support of Britain in WWII. I also found it odd that the cathedral crypt contained a memorial for George Washington. Talk about a forgiving tribute?
From the St. Paul’s Cathedral we headed to the National Gallery adjacent to Trafalgar Square. Normally, walking through a gallery checking
Tower of London
The building inside the Tower of London that holds the crown jewels. out various paintings is not my typical choice. However, when that gallery has works by Leonardo, Botticelli, Monet, Rembrandt, and van Gogh, I opted to indulge my aesthetic side. Every once and awhile a painting would pull me in, but don’t worry, I won’t be turning into a fruity art lover anytime soon.
Feet tired from walking all day, we settled down for dinner. Filling the evening with more wandering around the social centers, we collectively relaxed and enjoyed some time well spent people watching. One observation about London, why is it you can never find a trashcan in this city when you need one? I don’t know how many times I went off on a safari searching for a damn trashcan. Also, why is it so tempting to twist my own words in a way that it sounds as if I have a British accent? More then once I caught myself ordering things with a hint of an accent. I wanted to kick myself in the ass for being such an idiot and throwing a retarded attempt at an accent in their faces. It’s just so damn alluring to try!
Tuesday I ventured out on my own.
London Eye
Didn't ride it though. Cloudy day. The first stop was the Tower of London. The crown jewels are probably the biggest attraction, but hearing about the overall history of the castle from one of the Beefeater’s was really the showstopper for me. Based on the way the information is presented during the tour, it really seems like Britain ruled with a steel fist. All the detail on Guy Fawkes plot to blow up parliament and the aftermath also peaked my interest to look into the topic in greater detail at a later time.
Next I stopped in at the Dali Expedition by The London Eye. I currently have a picture drawn by Dali hanging in my bedroom (Swans to Elephants I believe), so I thought it a nice break to learn a little more about the man behind the drawing. As most great artists are, the guy was a real eccentric. I came across one particular painting that I am determined to get a copy of once I return to the United States. The painting involved the silhouette of Abraham Lincoln. I’m not sure if it’s in mass production, but you can bet I’ll do the research to find out. Overall, there really wasn’t much
City View Hotel
Where we stayed. Fish, chicken, and chips! Yum! to the exhibit, but if I manage to locate the Lincoln painting I’ll look back on the trip as a real reward.
Finally, I stopped in at the British Museum to see the Egyptian, Assyrian, and Greek exhibits. The Egyptian artifacts were the most impressive, including the ever so popular Rosetta Stone. The Assyrian Lion Hunt exhibit was surprisingly the highlight of my trip. Following the action of the hunt through the various carvings proved very interesting and extremely detailed. I think by this point I was on sightseeing overload, as the British Museum never really pulled me in. I guess being from Washington D.C., the idea of another museum just seemed redundant to a point.
Dinner Tuesday evening was at a hole in the wall Mexican restaurant I believe was called Pacifico. It was nice to find a place where we both enjoyed our meal, cause as a whole we were both very disappointed with the meals we’d eaten on the trip. From there we went back to Covenant Garden and hopped into a bar called Reflex. We hung around there for a couple hours before calling it a night. With the early rise ahead, and the
Self Potrait at St. Paul's
Clearly a bad idea. Can you say "Shave much?" possible airport headaches, I didn’t want to press my luck.
Out of bed at 6:00am, Lei and I exchanged goodbyes as I headed to the airport. Thankfully, getting through security was a piece of cake as it took all of five minutes. I guess in this case it helped that I was flying out of London Stansted Airport instead of Heathrow. If you paid attention to any of the British media outlets over the past week, it certainly seemed that it was a total crapshoot on whether you or your luggage would arrive as scheduled. Typical Chicken Little press coverage.
I’m really looking forward to the next week and a half in Scandinavia. Things kickoff in Oslo and the Norway in a Nutshell fjord tour on Thursday morning. Till then….
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Ale
non-member comment
Re: Accent
Yeah, I found myself trying to fake an accent over there, was Lei doing it too? When it happens, you got to catch yourself, and instantly plunge into a really bad Austrian accent, then introduce yourself as a disposable lighter technician from Mexico. By the way, have you hit up any of the street vendors for fish and chips? I'd probably be eating that and indian cuisine non-stop over there. Y'all be safe.