London - Into the Tower, and "Down" at the Astoria

Tuesday May 30th would be our last day at the Madison House on Gower Street in London. It was so strange getting packed up and ready for check-out because it really seemed as if we just got there. We arranged with Maggie to leave our bags there for the day, and headed out. We hit up the "Pret A Manger" cafe for some machiatos and breakfast sandwiches and enjoyed them at one of the tables set up out on the sidewalk. Our morning mission was to find the Astoria Theatre and get tickets for the "Down" concert that night. (last night's show was sold out, so they added a second) We stopped into a few ticketing agencies to see if they sold tickets, and they did not, but cheerily gave us directions to the theatre box office at Charing Cross and Tottenham Court Road. The girl behind the ticket window there wasn't blessed with the morning cheeriness we'd encountered elsewhere, but I guess it's consistent with the dark aura of the Astoria anyway. We collected two tickets and tucked them away. The doors would open at 7pm, so we had a full day in London to enjoy in the meantime, and we chose to visit the infamous Tower of London. The weather, although crisp and at times downright chilling, was cooperative, and the sky was a pretty mix of blue and white puffly clounds. After queing for tickets, we walked through the entrance gate and encountered a large group of people being talked to by a chap all dressed up in some kind of uniform, who turned out to be "Allen", and he would be giving us a free guided tour of the grounds for the rest of the afternoon. Allen was absolutely wonderful. He was a real live Beefeater, one of well under a hundred such men in the country. Hysterical, dry, devilishly charasmatic, a wealth of knowledge, with a self-admitted resemblence to Sylvester Stallone. We stayed on the grounds for the rest of the day, touring the white chapel, the white tower, the bloody tower, and of course the Crown Jewels. It was all very well done, and since Vee had recently read the book "The Other Boleyn Girl", she was absolutely captivated by everything. Nearing 5pm, we had to hustle back to the Mad House, get our backs and check in at our new hotel in the Paddington area of the city. Once above ground at the Edgemore stop on the Bakerloo line, Vee successfully navigated us to the hotel, and the friendly Indian hotelier greeted us in his yellow flip-flops, and got us settled into our cigarette smoke-infused itty bitty room with it's stained walls, carpeting, furniture and bedspread. It appeared the sheets were clean though, as well as the towel, and complimentary mini-soap. We inspected the shared toilet, and shared shower, and everything looked to be usable, so we dropped off our bags, and went to the little Boots corner market to refresh our depleted supply of shampoo, conditioner, soap and razors, and quickly returned to the hotel to drop it all off before heading down to the Astoria. Once there, around 7:15pm or so, we went into the theater and saw it would be PERFECT for seeing a concert. We found ourselves on the balcony, and made our way to a little booth type of arrangement that we comandeered for ourselves. From there we had a direct view to the entire stage, the crowd below, and no one could sit behind us, and no one could block our view in front. Before the band came out, they showed a collection of videos from their own silly road-tour archives, and videos from other bands that they obviously considered to be their influences (Queen, Black Sabbath, Lynrd Skynrd, Metallica, Cro-Mags, Slayer, etc.) and finally, with the stage filled up with smoke-machine induced cloud cover, Down came out and rocked the house for a solid two hours. This is a band that only has two CDs, and hasn't put anything new out in years. They are made up of active members from the bands Crowbar, Pantera, and Corrosion of Conformity and it was easy to hear all their influences in the music. There was endless moshing, crowd-surfing, fist banging and devil horns, and after 2 encores, they finally called it a night. Also, they were filming, so hopefully we'll end up on their DVD or music video, whatever it is that they were filming for. After the show, we bought what turned out to be an ENORMOUS portion of fish and chips, which was delicious, and devoured that on the street corner while we watched the interesting crowd of concert goers filter out of the theater. One chap, came around the corner a bit more wobbly-kneed and googly-eyed than most. As I watched him serpentine the sidewalk towards us, he began, ever so casually, spitting up onto himself and the sidewalk, continuing on his way, while continuing to vomit all over himself. I can only guess that somewhere in his every-so-slight consciousness, he must have been thinking that if he acted like nothing was happening, no one would notice. Hilarious! Somehow, we managed to finish our fish and chips. And, with a quick stop into a quickie mart for some water and goodies, we went back to the hotel and crashed.

London - Speakers Corner, and Some Down Time

Sunday, the 28th, we spent the day in Hyde Park, Speakers Corner. Vee had an exchange with a Socialist orator, and I spent a good portion of my time hoping that the bald believer in metaphysics was going to have something interesting to say. Unfortunately, because of hecklers, most of the exchanges were reduced to rubbish. Once Vee and I caught up with each other, we did find one speaker that was quite good, and he was speaking about our need to put racist, elitist behaviors and thinking aside so that we as individuals could start acting as one. He was quite good at diffusing hecklers with a powerful wit, intellect and humor, and his message, was ultimately a positive one, though some of his rantings served to undercut his posturing. Having only a coffee, and a shared muffin earlier in the morning by the lake, we walked towards Covent Garden and ended up in a Garfunkels for dinner. In Covent Garden, we got to see some silly street performances, some street musicians, and a whole lot of arts, crafts, clothes, jewelry, etc. It was a gratifying day.

Monday the 29th, would just be a work day. However, we did go out for a proper English breakfast, and that was quite exciting (for me). My meal consistend of an over easy egg, ham, sausage, hash browns, baked beans and toast, while Vee, after having been denied both a bagel and a croissant due to the bank holiday interupting bakery deliveries, enjoyed a smoked salmon and creamed cheese on toasted whole wheat sandwich. The rest of the day, I clipped interesting news articles, read all of my accumulated newspapers and my book, while Vee worked on the newest videos for the website. We did get out for a late dinner break at Wagamama's, which is a noodle bar a few blocks from here. Poor Vee mis-ordered and got stuck with a spicy curry ramen noodle and chicken dish. My dish was delicious: a rice noodle, chicken and vegetable bowl and fried veggie dumplings. On the way back, we stopped into our favorite little corner market and got some more cookies and beer for the rest of the night.

London - Shopping in the Rain

Saturday May 27th, we took some time off from more the more cultural stuff (not sure if Footloose and Blue Man Group really qualifies here...) and hit the two poles of London shopping: 1) Camden Town, 2) Harrods. It was a day of intermittant heavy rains, but luckily, many of the booths in the markets of Camden Town had some kind of overhead protection and although we got wet, it wasn't too bad. We totally enjoyed ourselves, walking the endless markets where you could buy just about anything that was, ummmmh, "fringy". There were lots of places selling vintage clothing, lots of studded leather, piercing shops, platform boots, t-shirts, antiques, international foods (the burrito we shared was awesome!), artwork, crafts, jewelry, hats, and bags. In an attempt to satisfy Vee's need for a breakfast-oriented meal, we stopped in a little cafe for coffees and cakes, which provided a nice break from the rain as well. Having bought some gifts for a few special folks, we then caught the tube to Knightsbridge and walked the world famous Harrod's department store for a few hours. The spectrum of products available for sale was wide-ranging, and the prices were absolutely ridiculously exhorbatant. In the kids toys section, there was a "toy" jeep that was a miniature Land Rover jeep listed at over 22,000 Br pounds (about $40k). The bed sets we liked started at about $5k. And, a funny looking ladies t-shirt was $150. We bought a 10oz bottle of lemonade, and it set us back about $2.50 which was cheap in comparison to everything else. We took the tube back to Leicester Square, since our Goodge Street station was closed for renovations of the Northern Line, and walked back to our hotel with a quick stop in a cafe for some early evening refreshments, and later we picked up some fish and chips, beers and sweets. The rest of the night we read, wrote, and talked. The Madison House lost electricity today, and I found the computers in their lab to not be working, nor their Internet connection so I got all that fixed for them, and now we have wireless Internet in our room too. Yay!!!

London - War, Tower Bridge and Blue Men

Friday, May 26th. Another INCREDIBLE day!! We started things off by trying out the Costa Cafe and relaxing with the paper and the usual morning yummies. It was nice to have a bit of downtime before our continued whirlwind tour would begin again. After an hour or so, we walked to Leicester Square and bought two half price tickets to tonights Blue Man Group show at 8pm. From there, we got the Northern Line tube south to Waterloo and changed to the Jubiliee line east to London Bridge where we visited the Britain At War Experience for an intense timewarp back into WWII Britain...bombing raid sirens, bomb shelters, gas masks and cigarette cards included. After we had our fill of the war experience, we walked across to Hays Galleria for a little snack and nice views of an odd sculpture, the HMS Belfast ship, and the city skyline. We then walked the riverfront to Tower Bridge and partook in the official Tower Bridge Experience which was very interesting and informative. We climbed to the top and walked the parallel footbridges and then took the lift under the towers to investigate the engine rooms. From there we hopped the London Bridge tube back to Waterloo and into the Royal Festival Hall for a free jazz show where we got to see a talented 3 piece band (piano, drums, bass) run through a number of songs before we headed out for a quick pint before the Blue Man show. Since there are pubs EVERYWHERE, there was no trouble finding one near the theater, and we had just the right amount of time to enjoy our drinks and have a really nice conversation. Then, up a few levels, and through door number 5, it was Blue Man time. This show was FANTASTIC! We had so much fun. Our faces were plastered with perma-grins. Afterwards, Vee got back inside the theater and got pics with the musicians, and one of the Blue Men! Then, a stop at a quick mart for some snacks and beers, and to the Madison House for the night.

London - Winnie and Witches

(Vee reporting)Thursday May 25th....today is my soulmate's birthday!!! We got up surprisingly early despite our late nights, and were already excited for the day ahead. Shortly before going to bed the night before, Cliff had already identified another play that has the highest rating given by the critics in London, and was also recommended to us by some folks here at the Madison house. With "The Crucible" in mind, and having learned that a Matinee was being played today we went in search of a cozy coffee-shop to complete our itinerary for the day. We found a small but very friendly place only a few blocks away from where we are staying. The Lavazza coffees were delicious, and so were the freshly backed pastries that we picked. During breakfast we had decided that we were going to try to get discount tickets for the play that Cliff had read about, but since it would start at 2:30pm, we would try to sneak in a visit to the "Cabinet War Rooms" and "Churchill Museum" first.
Sure enough, we got our 50% discount tickets for the play and made our way straight to the museum. The "war rooms" are the underground goverment and miliatry facilities or base from where Churchill (British Prime minister during WW2) and his staff managed the country during the time when Hitler and the Nazi party had made their goal to invade London. During 1940 and 1941 London suffered military bombing attacks on almost a daily basis, and it became crucial to guarantee the safety of the british goverment if there was any hope to resist the invasion. The incredible part of this exhibition is that it is not an exhibition. After VJ-Day, Churchill's goverment and military personnel who had been living underground for all these years, simply locked the place and left it untouched. Only 10 years ago was this underground fortress opened for the first time, and it was found exactly as it was left. Meeting rooms, gigantic maps filled with pins and notes, pencils, bedrooms, kitchens ...all as it had been left 60 years ago. It was almost surreal, even the smell seemed authentic. The "Churchill Museum" is the only area that was recently installed in one of the former meeting rooms. Unfortunately we were not able to spend all the time we wanted to in this section of the exhibition because we had a play to catch; however what we were able to see was incredibly impressive. The whole exhibit was very much computerized, with top technology used that I haven't seen in other museums (yet). Anyway, by 2:15 we HAD to leave, our play was starting in only a matter of minutes.
By now, Cliff and I have become masters at scanning a city-map in seconds and identifying the quickest route from point A to point B. We arrived to the theater right on time, and once again we were thrilled by the position of our seats and the beauty and character of the interiors of the place.
"The crucible" is the real-life dramatic story of the "justice" system in a small village outside of Boston in the 16th century that unfairly condemns and executes innocent women and men accused of witchcraft and the corruption of the church. (a.k.a., "The Salem Witch Trials") The play was so powerful and emotionally charged that more than once I had to swallow my tears. The quality of the actors, the script, the set and the story itself make this play probably the best I have seen in many years. Completely satisfied, but still heartbroken we left the theater. For this experience alone, I will not forget this day.
It was only 6pm and the day was still young and we had not yet eaten a proper meal. We walked through Chinatown and Cliff picked a cheap little Chinese buffet for only 5 pounds, and we loaded up and enjoyed. Then, we decided to relax a bit and had an enjoyable walk through Saint James Park, a beautiful green area filled with wild birds of all kinds of species. The weather turned out to be simply perfect and the sunset turned the sky into a beaituful mix of pinks and light blues. We continued our walk towards Buckingham Palace, and as good tourists, we made sure to take some pictures and video of the guards who patiently deal with shameless lookers like us. We then decided to head north towards a very expensive shopping area (Bond Street) that would eventually lead us to Oxford Avenue and then to our home. It is always fun to watch people, especially the unmistakeable sophistication of the Brits (men and women).
The day was simply beautiful and we decided to end it with a good pint of beer..Cliff's style. We ended up getting some delicious beers from the same bar where Cliff used to hang out when he was visitng London many years ago. It was just fun to be able to get our beers, go out and sit on the street wall where many other britons were enjoying their beers. We said our cheers ("cheers, prost, salud, and salute!"), drank our tasty beverages, and headed back home. To my love: Happy birthday Cliff and good night!

London - Lettn' Loose!

(Vee reporting) Wednesday, May 24th began with Cliff getting up very early to do our laundry. We have lately not been so good with our discipline of manually washing some of our light-weight clothing, and Cliff was on his last T-shirt. By 9 am I finally got up to find my clothes washed, dried and nicely folded on one of the the spare beds of our room. Yes, my hubby is truly an angel! Finally by 10 am we were showered, changed and ready to hit the streets of London. Cliff not only got our laundry done by 9 am, but he also managed to plan our whole itinerary for the day. We started heading towards the "London Museum". This was my first time visiting this Museum, however CLiff had been there before. It is an extraordinary exhibition that took us from thousands of years BC to the 20th century, managing to balance historical, cultural, social and architectural information for each period of its history. It took us 6 hours to go through the whole museum with a 30 minute coffee-break in between. Cliff and I have come to realize that these types of museums are so important for foreign visitors like us. It truly puts the city in question in a whole other perspective that allows us to appreciate its beauty reflected in its buildings, culture, people so much more. By the time we completed our tour we were obviously a bit tired, but so satisified with what we were able to learn and experience. Cliff suggested to walk by some of the imporant buildings that we had learned about. Saint Paul Cathedral for instance was the first major christian cathedral built in the old "Londinium" around the year 800 AD, after the saxo-normans had established themselves in this area, and long after it had gained its independance from the roman empire. Despite it having been almost completely destroyed two times in its life (due to two major fires) it was fortunately re-built each time, having been completed in the 18th century by Sir Christopher Wren. It is in incredible shape in comparison to most of the doms/cathedrals we have seen around Europe, and certainly amongst the most beautiful as well.
After Saint Paul's it was already 8pm, Cliff decided to surprise me one more time by taking me to my first play ever in London. Well aware of how the system works, Cliff walked me to the ticket discount-office in Leicester Square. Fortunately the line wasn't long at all, and after only a few minutes the ticket-officer was able to recommend the best prices and best seats for some of the plays of the night. After a quick chinese-noodles snack we were heading towards our theather to watch "FOOTLOOSE". What can I say....it was simply AWESOME!!! the actors were fantastic, and despite it being a musical, the songs were full of energy played by a live-band and the dancing....oh goodness the dancing was incredible. I loved it..I loved every minute of it.
The show ended around 10pm, and we were ready to go home.

Brussels to London - All Aboard the EuroStar!

Tuesday, May 23rd, we had our final breakfast in Brussels, checked out, took the train from Nord to Midi, and reserved seats for the 12:58 EuroStar to London. I finally convinced Vee to get herself a new book, and she bought "The Devil's Feather" by Minette Walters. After passing through several layers of passport checks, and security checks, we boarded the train for the 2 1/2 trip to London, passing the the "Chunnel" for 20 minutes along the way. It was a very comfortable and the time passed quickly as I chugged through the German paper "The Guardian" and Vee bit into her new book. In London, we found a very friendly guy at the Underground ticketing booth to help us with buying the right pass for the week, and with our 7 Day "Oyster" cards in hand, we took the tube from Waterloo to Goodge Street Station on the Central line. I was immediately reminded of one of the aspects of Londong that I love so much, and that is the musicians who play in the underground tunnels. Just as I remembered, the musicians were numerous, and very good! The Madison House, is only a few blocks from the Underground so we found it easily with the aid of a large map inside the entrance to the stop. We were greeted by the Professor in charge of this Summer's JMU Study Abroad program and he brought us inside and showed us his room, explaining that Maggie, the house manager would be back shortly to explain everything to us. We dumped our bags, and Maggie and her very sweet little daughter showed us around and gave us our keys. Then, we hit the road. First stop, was a pint, and fish and chips, which Vee and I both deeply savored. It was a small place that seems to have some designation as the best place in the city for Fish and Chips, and it was also recommended to us by Maggie. From there we just walked, and got acquainted with our surroundings. Having walked down Gower Street and eventually in the Liecester Square area, it was a bit strange, but immensely exciting to see the places that I had been back as a student in 1993. We passed St.Martin's in the Fields, Trafalgar Square, Big Ben, Parliament, Whitehall and crossed the bridge to where we bought some last minute half-price tickets to a Mozart symphony orchestra production in the Queen Elizabeth Hall. Hardly believing the surreality of our circumstances, we sat down in the lobby to share some coffee, all smiles, and waited for the doors to open. The show was amazing, and we left electrified. From there we crossed back over to Embankment and then just wandered in the darkening night and rain, passing through SoHo, Covent Garden, China Town, and eventually back to the Madison House sometime after 11pm. I met some of the guys and they were very friendly, asking me to join them out for a few late night 1 pound pints, but exhausted, I declined, as I needed to get online and check 3 days worth of unread emails before going off to bed.