I have now spent two days in London, and I must say that I am enjoying every bit of it so far. In writing these blogs, I have only been able to write a little bit or write a less detailed account, due to only one computer being available in the hotel. I am however tonight alone in the room, so I will hopefully be able to write down a detailed blog :) here goes!
On the first day of our London adventure things went according to plan and went without a hitch. We didn't have to ask people to move in order for us to sit in our reserved seats on the train, there were no major delays, and there were no grumpy old anti-social women sitting next to us (or anyone with bad BO too). We may have experienced the normal events that always occur on the train, e.g. people sticking their bum in your face, people listening to their music too loudly on their I-Pods or on their portable DVD player, and the feeling that your ear drums are going to bust whenever you go into a tunnel, but apart from that our journey there was plain sailing. The only problem we encountered was at home before we even left for the train station in Middlesborough, as we had to get up extra early in order to get in and out of the bathroom before the tilers arrived. They were meant to arrive some time before we departed for London, but they arrived when we where half way between Darlington and Middlesborough. Oh well.
Within around five hours, me and my mum both made it to London (or Smoke as my mum keeps saying is also its nickname). With our big pink suitcase we then set off, and within 30 mins or so, arrived at our hotel for our London adventure, the Ridgemount Hotel. My brother had stayed here previously in order to take part in some work experience down in London, and had told us that the hotel had a Fawlty Towers feeling to it. We however are yet to meet a grumpy and bad tempered owner, a maid who tries to solve everyone's problems, or a foreign waiter who always says "Que?". We were given a very nice and warm greeting, and were lucky to discover that our room was only on the first floor. After having a shower to cool ourselves down, as London was extremely hot and warm in Summer, we then ventured out into the centre of LondonAfter only walking around for a few minutes in London, we soon learned a few things:
1. Red lights and green lights in London both mean go
2. People who want to give advertising stuff or a newspaper to you tend to shove it into your face, making it almost impossible for you to resist grabbing it and taking it away with you
3. It is true that Japanese tourists tend to have their cameras with them all the time, and
4. Everything is bigger in London
On the way to eat our dinner at The Stockpot, a very nice and well priced mini restaurant in the middle of Soho, we bumped into Freddie Mercury in all his glory, although he was not very talkative in his giant and golden shaped stance. After eating our meal we then headed off to see our first theatre production in London: Blood Brothers. Having seen the show previously in Darlington, we decided to see it once again in order to see how it was done in London. We were totally amazed by the difference in the actoring, scenery and music of the play in comparison to Darlington, as I myself was once again totally transfixed by the story, moved by the powerful script, metaphors, and messages presented throughout, and in the lead up to the final and climatic scene I could feel my heart pounding and the adrenaline rushing around my body as I watched it unfold. We certainly won't forget about the Johnstone Twins that easily :)
Once the play had finished we then headed back to the hotel to get what we thought would be a good night's sleep, only to discover that people who left their hotel window open during the night in London were to be kept up all night, by the sound of traffic and what sounded like tanks driving through brick walls at the speed of light :( We learned our lesson there.
In our 2nd day of London, our first full day in London, we decided to go for a long walk around the major sights in London. During this walk I was also hoping to spot some celebrities but unfortunately met no one, despite the fact Leonardo DiCaprio had been spotted in London the other day. On the other hand my mum says we walked past Nigel Havers on the way back to the hotel. I however didn't see him and had no idea who the hell he was until later. Great :(
During our long walk we first went to Trafalgar Square, and did the usual things that tourists do; climbed up Nelson's Column, attempted to climb up one of the lions, wondered what on earth the people on the Plinth were doing, and enjoyed the fact that they have got rid of all those damn pigeons.We next walked up the famous Mall road, and saw Buckingham Palace in the distance, as well as catching a glimpse of how royalty and celebrities are treated in London, as we saw two police cars swarm down the Mall to stop all the traffic going down in one direction followed by a fairly blacked out car, which immediately drove into the Palace and vanished from everyone's sight. I thought personally that Prince William was in the car but I could be wrong.
After walking part way up the mall, we first saw part of the Royal National Guard, with their funny black hats, march part way down the mall to then suddenly vanish down a side street. After reaching Buckingham Palace we then started to wonder why all these tourists were swarming round the Palace and the Queen Victoria Statue. We realised soon afterwards that everyone was queuing up to see the Changing of the Guard, which is basically when a set of funny red men in black hats march into a building, do a little army marching stuff, and then make another set of red army man piss off. We both stayed down to see what happened during this Change, but it turned out to be nothing spectular for us, as due to our homeland being England we were both accustomed to seeing members of the army or other royal services march down roads and highstreets.
Our next destination, after walking past the World War I memorial in London, was Kensington Gardens, where we first saw the Princess Diana Memorial (which turned out to just be a little water feature, which was nice but in my opinion a little unworthy of Princess Diana's Legacy).
Towards the end of the garden we also saw the Peter Pan Statue. Both me and my mum were amazed by the quality of detail on the Peter Pan Statue, as we expected it to be a lot worse than it was, and were even more amazed to find out that the Statue had been there since the early 20th Century and was still in very good condition. Although the statue made it look as if Wendy was looking up Peter Pan's outfit to look at another magical pipe altogether, it was enjoyable none the less. After then walking all the way back to Buckingham Palace, we headed off to see the Parliament Buildings in London, and saw Big Ben in all it's glory (the number of people like us who wanted to have a photo of them taken in front of Big Ben whilst on Westminster Bridge was astounding.
We then headed back to the hotel and took an alternate route in order to go and see Downing Street, only to see that it is now completely fenced off to the public, making it impossible to see 10 Downing Street let alone hardly any part of street. My mum herself was amazed that there was a barrier, as 30 years ago you were able to walk up and down the street as much as you liked. After walking back to the hotel and sorting ourselves out, we then headed off to have our dinner at Wetherspoons, which was very nice but extremely busy and our food took longer to be served in comparison to The Stockpot. After having our meals, we then headed off to The Palladium Theatre (which I didn't realise until half way through the show is where the Royal Variety Show takes place), and my right knee started acting up, as it become quite uncomfortable to walk and at one point even stand. Little did I know that my knee would ache for the rest of the holiday :(.
Whilst in the Palladium Theatre we saw the new musical - Sister Act, which I hoped was worth the quite expensive price that we had had to pay in order to get the tickets. I myself had never seen the original film and was informed by my mum after looking through the programme that all the songs in the play were new and original.
At the start of the play I wasn't quite convinced that the show was going to be any good, but once the show settled itself, and reached the third or fourth song, it completely took off. The show was amazing. The one-liners, humour and interaction between the characters was top notch, and the changes in the scenery of the play was outstanding and amazing to watch. I have never ever seen scene changes like the ones that appeared in Sister Act, and I doubt that I will see any scene changes in any other play surpass the greatness of the ones in Sister Act. My mum also thought it was excellent and did not mind that the play didn't contain any of the old songs, with the song "Take Me To Heaven" especially going down a storm with the crowd. If I ever get the chance to see it again, I would without a second's thought :)
During the play both me and my mum believed that we also spotted some celebrities, as I believed I saw Louis Theroux (or at least a very good look-a-like) sitting to the far left of us with a blonde, where as my mum kept going on about this lad a few rows down, whom she kept saying was someone famous and most likely off Coronation Street. After getting home and researching the mysterious celeb, it exactly turns out that we may have seen a Celebrity during Sister Act after all, and it might have been Paul Nicholls, a celeb most famously known for playing the part of Joe Wicks on Eastenders (not Coro after all).
A person worth bragging about seeing? Who knows!
Well the first two days of London have been brillant, and I hope that the next two days in London are just as good, if not even better. Thanks for reading
Until next time, Stay Happy
Cheeky Lamby
xxx
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