Return to London

We went into London from Reading several times.

We rode Great Western Railroad to Paddington then the Underground around London

    SuperBloom at Tower of London was one of the first places we visited.  In honor of the Queen's Jubilee, they planted 3 of the 4 sides of the moat for the Tower of London with wild flowers that are planned to bloom throughout the summer.  The moat has had grass in it since 1845.  It was really pretty with just waves of colors changing as we walked around the tower.   I recognized most of the flowers but there were some that were new to me like one from the brochure called Annual Toadflax or another called Viper's burgloss.

London Bridge in background

Kensington Park and the Victoria and Albert Museum - our original trip plan had us staying in the Kensington area in a flat for 2 weeks, but alas Covid ruined that plan so visiting is all we did.  Have to admit walking around Kensington and Hyde Parks made me wish we had gotten to stay here.  Kensington and Hyde Parks are in very nice residential areas.  After we wandered around the parks we headed to the Victoria and Albert Museum.

The museum is considered to be a museum of art and design.  It is arranged by geographic and time periods.  You find a room full of artifacts from the Singh's during 1500s say and another that is full of things from artifacts from early 1900s Europe.  On top of that, the building itself is amazing.  All of the memorials and halls related to Victoria and Albert are quite simply beautiful.  The buildings often have an area with underlying meaning.  For example, on the Albert memorial below, each corner is a region with a statute with related topics such as an American Indian in the Americas region.  While in the museum café, the walls above the windows were tiled with words of wisdom.

Memorial to Prince Albert.

Inside Victoria and Albert Museum

the bed from a lord's bedroom

really like this chair makes me think of the rag rugs my grandma made.  In the current room display.

    Gordon's Wine Bar - on another day, we went into London to go to the musical Six and then to visit Gordon's Wine Bar which a cousin had recommended.  Gordon's is the oldest wine bar in London and has been open for over 130 years.  The indoor portion is under ground and the seating is in caves - no electricity in that area - only candles at the tables.  It is also known for its port and sherry wines some of which are served from the cask.  Like most people we got a glass of wine and stood around waiting for a table.  It was Father's Day and were asked to move away from a beat-up old photo by a group so the 2 men could take a photo in front of it.  The one guy then proceeds to tell me how he had come here many times with his father who always went to that photo.  It seemed that the photo was dad's platoon in the Boer war in South Africa.  We talked with the couples for a few minutes and then we had a table.  The wine we had was nice and then we shared some fortified wines since it was their specialty! It is definitely a unique place.

at our table in the cave

Six is based on the six wives of Henry VIII.  In London, all of the theaters are small so there is rarely a bad seat.  Six is so popular Jeff and I had to accept individual seats a few rows apart.  We enjoyed the show once we got used to the accents.  It is almost a concert with a storyline, there are no set changes, I would recommend the show.

St Paul's Cathedral - on our last trip into London, we visited the St Paul's Cathedral, The Globe Theatre, picked up some whisky and went to an Italian restaurant.  Our timing had been off before and had not been able to visit either St Paul's or the Globe so better late than never.  

While in Oxford, we had seen the Sheldonian Theatre that Christopher Wren had designed early in his career and now off to his masterpiece - St Paul's Cathedral.   Easy part first - it is gorgeous inside.  The bright gold patina on wood and plaster and oh my all of the mosaics and all of this on top of a very nicely designed church/cathedral.  We opted out of the audio tour and chose to walk around and read the placards.  The prior St Paul's Cathedral burned in the great London fire of 1666.  In 1668 Wren starts to design the new/current cathedral, it took until 1711 for it to be completed.  Since this is after the reformation, there are no icons in the building instead you will find a lot of statutes to military leaders and war memorials.  Many of those are on the first floor, there is a crypt in the basement with even more memorials and stones/monuments to people although in the crypt there is an artist corner so you do find people other than the country's late warriors.  Oh,  Jeff and I had a laugh.  There are plaques for all of the lead organists for couple of hundred years.  Jeff said I can hear it now in the interview - we can't pay you well, but you will be remembered for eternity by the plaque we make for you.

As we wandered, I noticed a sign that said the above window's stain glass was lost to a bombing in 1940.  Per a write up I saw part of the cathedral was hit on Dec 29th, 1940, but it was a small area.  Said there were a couple of other times when out buildings were hurt and some walls were thrown out of alignment.  We overheard a tour guide describe how many key items and statutes were removed from the cathedral before the bombings began, but there was one statute that was left behind.  The main caretaker at the time regularly slept by that statute and had a saying that he (the statue) was looking after him.

In the crypt, they had an exhibition set up for the Queen's Jubilee.  They had pictures from her past jubilees and from the previous kings and queens who had jubilees.  Seems it is part of the jubilee tradition to have a mass of thanksgiving at St Paul's.  The exhibition had a cloak that the bishop had worn at an earlier jubilee mass.  It was impressive.  An embroidery school had stitched together this large cape like garment with buildings and symbols for much of the Commonwealth.

Shakespeare's Globe Theater - the Globe Theater and St Paul's Cathedral are close to each other.  They are on opposite sides of the Thames River with the millennium pedestrian bridge connecting them.  I will be honest I went to the Globe because I thought I should.  I am happy I went because I really enjoyed the tour.  This is a very good reproduction of the theatre that Shakespeare would have appeared in during his lifetime.  It was opened in 1997 after 50 years of research and slow construction.  When I say very good reproduction, I mean they used the same type of wood that was common in the day (unseasoned even), they used the same materials for the plaster like walls and thanks to carbon footprints and some old drawings were able to deduce the most likely building layout including the fact that many patrons are in a ground area standing.  The theater is an active theater for Shakespeare plays.  While we toured, we saw a group rehearsing a modern-day version of the Tempest. It was an enjoyable 50 minute tour.  Unfortunately, since they were in rehearsals for a new play that has not been reviewed yet we were not able to take any photos. Don’t ask where these came from.   

Whisky Exchange - note the UK spelling.  We had found a whisky we really like in Scotland and wanted to take some home.  That was easier said than done until we learned of this place and able to order it from them.  It was a very nice and interesting shop.  This is the entire width of the shop.

Bar at the Shard as in the large office building called the Shard.  While on the train going to Stonehenge/Salisbury.  I ended up sitting next to guy and talking with him.  He suggested that one of the best views of the London skyline was from the bar of the Shard.  We had some time to kill before dinner and by shear chance were right at the Shard so up we went.  This was after we visited the Borough Market which was nearby.  If you are in London and need some nice quality food, go to this food market the food looked wonderful.

We are a fan of Stanley Tucci’s Searching for Italy on CNN.  On the last episode we saw he visited London, where he resides instead of a region in Italy.   On the show he introduced us to “The Mammas” at La Mia Mamma restaurant.  Each of their 3 restaurants features a different region of Italy with Mammas from that region on a rotating basis.  Click here to watch a 62 second clip from the show.  On one of our last evenings in Britain, we made reservations and did variations of their tasting menu for the evening.  The restaurant we visited was hosting mamas from the Sardegna region of Italy.  We had to hurry to get there on time, but enjoyed our evening once we relaxed.  It started with an Aperol Aperitif and ended with a small panna cotta and cheesecake.  In between a huge antipasta plate, some pasta and a main dish.  The antipasta plate had probably 10 different things on it from fried ravioli to olives to small dishes and bread.

And finally, we ran across this whimsical art installation in the area of St Paul's.

There is room for two people to join these characters at the dinner table.
I should have taken a Panoramic photo to capture the entire table.