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Published: September 14th 2022
The Blackbird
We’re staying in a room above the pub.We’ve had a great time these last two days in London, and this blog will cover both days.
Day 1 in London: we had another leisurely morning this morning (I’m going to have to get used to getting up early again soon!), and walked to the Eastbourne train station (about a 15 min walk) to get the train to London - Victoria Station. It was cloudy and very slightly drizzly, but not too bad at all.
The train to London usually takes about 1 ½ hours, but there were some delays as, we were informed, someone was hit by a train (close to Gatwick airport). I think the lines were closed after that, so it was lucky we got through when we did. Unfortunately the person who was hit by the train was killed, I found out later.
We got off at the end of the line, Victoria Station, and switched to the tube, where we took the District Line to Earl’s Court. We had Oyster cards from previous trips, so we topped them up and used them to tap in and out. Our hotel (a very cute little pub called The Blackbird – they have nine guest
rooms above the pub) was just down the street from the tube station, so it worked out really well. We were able to check in right away, which was nice. We have a very cute little room, two floors up a very steep stairway (there is a lift too but we didn’t need it as we only had a small backpack for overnight). The stairway reminded me a bit of the narrow steep stairways in our B&B in Amsterdam (but not as steep!).
We checked out the room, then went down to the pub for a beer and a snack. We shared a vegetarian mini pie, which was very tasty, and we each just had a ½ pint.
We then headed out to the Victoria & Albert Museum. It was two tube stops away, but we decided to walk instead. We probably did not take the most direct route, but we found the V&A just fine, and had a pleasant walk too. The museum doesn’t have audio guides, but a tour of the British Galleries had just started, so we quickly joined it. It was a pleasant 45 min tour, and then we checked out several different areas
of the museum, my favourite being the “Islamic Middle East” gallery. I really love Islamic art. We wandered around, and visited the gift shop. Then I continued to the “Design 1900-Now” exhibit, but ended up passing through many other exhibits on the way, and I got an idea of the enormity of the museum’s collections. The jewellery rooms alone were incredible. I met Susan back at the entrance and we took the tube back to Earl’s Court and to our cosy room at the Blackbird.
We shared a Peroni (supplied in the mini-fridge), and I started this blog, and we watched the BBC News coverage of the events around the Queen’s funeral procession. Her coffin was transported from Edinburgh to Buckingham Palace today and will be transported to Westminster Abbey tomorrow. It is kind of unbelievable we are here in London at this historic time. People are camping out at Buckingham Palace tonight so they can see her coffin before it is taken to Westminster Abbey. (We plan on going to the Palace tomorrow morning, just to see what’s going on and to feel a part of it all).
We went back down to the pub for dinner,
Victoria & Albert Museum
Turned out this wasn’t the entrance. and I had a nice smoked salmon salad and a pint of Fuller’s Frontier lager (a local beer), and Susan had a mini pie trio paired with three small beers. I definitely like English lagers better than the ales, which are very flat tasting to me. We made a coffee in the room and watched more coverage of the Queen. It’s raining now, and I’m hoping it won’t be pouring tomorrow, but we’re prepared with our raincoats and umbrellas if it is!
Day 2 in London: We started the day with a very nice breakfast in the Blackbird, which was included in our stay. Susan had the full English and I had the plant-based English. I asked for the children’s portion, as I can never finish large meals, but the portion that came was pretty big! We then headed out to Buckingham Palace, taking the tube from Earl’s Court to Victoria, then walking to the Palace. It turned out to be quite a nice morning, and it got quite sunny in the afternoon, so the weather was much better than forecasted.
As expected, the area around Buckingham Palace was very busy and the Mall, as well as other
roads, were closed. We were able to get fairly close to the Palace, though, where the crowds were at least 6 deep along the Mall, where the procession was to take place several hours later. We walked around the area, and in St. James Park (I remember it from previous visits, it’s so lovely). There were lots of tributes to the Queen in shops, and lots of flowers left around trees in the area around the Palace. It was just nice to be there on such an important day, although we were not going to stay for the procession. We would have had to have been there many hours earlier to get a place where we could view the procession.
We made our way eventually to a tube station, after asking several people for directions, as it was hard to get around with all the road closures. Everyone was very helpful and we found a station after walking for quite awhile. We took the tube to Russell station, where we were to meet our London Walks guide for our British Museum tour at 2:15. We had time to pop into a pub for a light lunch (we shared a
Detail in the Music Room
This panel depicts architecture cheese and tomato toastie, and each had a half pint of lager), then we met our guide for our tour, and walked with the guide and other people on the tour to the British Museum.
There were about 13 other people on the tour with us, and it was a really excellent and informative two hour tour. The guide was extremely knowledgeable about Egyptian and other histories, and we enjoyed it a lot. We visited different exhibits including the Egyptian galleries (my absolute favourite), the Assyrian galleries, the Parthenon Sculptures, and the Sutton Hoo exhibit. The Sutton Hoo exhibit is really interesting. A burial mound was discovered at Sutton Hoo in 1939, which turned out to be a decayed ship full of Anglo-Saxon treasures, dating to about 600 CE. It must have been the grave of a very important Anglo-Saxon person. When we saw the exhibit Susan and I realized we had seen a movie about the discovery of Sutton Hoo - it is a 2021 film called ”The Dig”. It’s a really good movie if you‘re interested in this sort of thing (I think it’s on Netflix).
I got to see the Rosetta Stone again (we had
seen it when we visited in 2011), which was almost as exciting as the first time! I found the photo of me from 2011, and I can’t believe it, I am wearing the same shirt! 😂. It must be practically the oldest item of clothing I own (I don’t wear it very often, but it’s great for travel as it’s long sleeved, but lightweight, and doesn’t wrinkle).
After the tour ended we went back to the Egyptian funerary exhibits section, as we had just walked through it on the tour, and had a look at the amazing displays. Then we went back to the Egyptian sculpture gallery so I could get a photo with the Rosetta Stone (it was less crowded a bit later), and look at more of the Egyptian sculptures. I would have stayed longer, but they were closing the room, quite a bit earlier than the museum closing time of 6 pm, which was kind of annoying as I wanted to see the Gayer-Anderson cat, one of the museum’s masterpieces. But I did see it on our previous visit so I had to be content with that. I remember now that we went to the Gayer-Anderson
museum when we were in Cairo (he was a collector of Egyptian artifacts, and he donated the cat to the museum in 1939).
We left the museum, and took the tube back to Earl’s Court, so we could pick up our backpack at the Blackbird where we had stored it for the day. We were thirsty from all the walking so we had a pint of Fuller Frontier lager, which definitely hit the spot. We got a take-away sandwich from Paul (we had pain au chocolate and coffee at Paul in Paris), and took the tube back to Victoria station where we got the train back to Eastbourne, about an hour and a half journey. We shared the sandwich on the train, and got to the Eastbourne station close to 8:30, where Carol Ann was kindly waiting to pick us up so we didn’t have to walk back in the dark. We watched a bit of the coverage of the Queen’s procession on TV, then I worked on the blog. I’m ready to hit the hay, as it is after 11, and it’s been a long, but great, day!
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MJ
non-member comment
Rosetta Stone Shirt
Would love to see both photos of you in the same shirt and the Rosetta Stone. What a hoot!