After returning from Wales we had four days to explore London, not nearly enough time to do the city justice but, just enough time for us, since I feel we were ready to go home by Monday. We started Saturday off by just relaxing and doing some retail therapy that took us from Oxford Street down to Trafalgar Square and back up around to Covenant Garden where we stopped for the best fish and chips in London, according to my friend Ashley, at Rock and Sole, I have to say it was some of the best fish and chips I’ve had but my mom thinks she had better at Loch Ness (you guys will have to argue that one out yourselves). I was also shocked to order the Budvair or Chezh version of Budweiser, tasted just like regular Bud. After our shopping we wondered down to the Themes, Westminster Abbey, Parliament and Big Ben, since I’ve seen them as a kid we just looked at them from outside as neither one of us really wanted to stand in the long lines to enter. Then we walked from Westminster to Victoria and hopped on the tube out to Seven Sisters area and out to Yum Yum, a terrific Thai restaurant in an old Georgian house or Hospital (we heard both tales, but couldn’t decipher which one from the outside).
Sunday was all about reliving the birth, life and death (of many rockers) on a rock tour through London. The guide was good (he was an American from Chicago who wished he had lived in the 60’s to experience the scene) but was very knowledgeable and entertaining. I didn’t realize so much of the Rock originated in London and so many of the key players also died in London, hard times playing music, drinking and doing drugs. We started off at Trident Studios on Abbey Court, then headed to Denmark Street, also known as Tin pan Alley or publishing row back in the day, we drove through Camden, where the music scene is now, stopped by Britannia Row where Pink Floyd has office across from the school where they borrowed the children for the song ‘Brick in the Wall’, headed up one of the only hills in London to the Alexandra Palace where Pink Floyd held the 14 hour Technicolor dream concert (the building is vacant now but, there are plans to turn it back into a concert hall), next it was off to tea at the Clissoled Arms, the restaurant across the street from the original house of the Kinks and the first place they ever played, next it was off to Abbey Road to recreate a Beetles album cover and see Abbey Recording Studios, and finally 34 Montagu Street home to Ringo Starr (or used to be), all before pausing for lunch, whew! I think we learned about 5 deaths before lunch and there were more to follow after, I really don’t understand the drug use of the 60’s and 70’s.
After lunch it was back on the Rock bus and off to American Disaster, now called the Hard Rock Café, the only place in London in 1971 that served burgers and beer together, the tale goes that American Disaster became the Hard Rock as we know it today because Eric Clapton loved the place so much he wanted to save a table so he donated a guitar to be hung above his table and then Pete Townsend did the same and now you have restaurants all over the world with rock memorabilia. Next we saw the pub Horse and Groom on Beetley, a back alley pub so obscure it’s not open on the weekends, and a frequent watering hole of the Beetles. Next it was off to Chelsea and King’s Road, famous in the 60’s and 70’s for small boutiques and the place where Live Aid started and the story of the Sex Pistols (who only lasted 18months) as a band Vivian Westwood’s husband set up because he didn’t like the rock scene and said any band would be popular even if they couldn’t play a note, I guess he was kind of right. After King’s Road it was a drive up along the river Themes to see the Battersea Power Station, the main art in Pink Floyd’s Animals album cover, supposedly the photographer didn’t like photo shop so they made a balloon pig and tied it to the stacks for the shot, well sometime during photographing the pig got loose and floated up into Heathrow’s airspace, the air traffic control though the reports from their pilots about a flying pig were bogus but, it was the first air traffic alert for a floating pig; I guess hell froze over that day, since the pig was flying, wish I could have been there to ski (okay, okay, bad joke). We also stopped at Bill Wyman’s Sticky Fingers Restaurant and Bar, he is a Rolling Stone, saw the location of Island Records, the location of the Beetle’s last concert which happened on a roof on Savile Road, and we saw the death place of Jimi Hendrix, who actually died on his way to hospital because the paramedics sat the stretcher upright and left him unattended and unconscious on a 2 minute ride to the hospital, he was dead on arrival from chocking on vomit, sad negligence, or so the story goes. It was very tragic to lose Jimi, he was such a talented artist, in fact so talented that the London National Heritage committee has a plaque outside his old home commemorating him, he is the only singer/artist to have a plaque and he’s American, crazy. They are hoping to get a George Harrison plaque soon, but that’s under petition now. So much information on a tour, I couldn’t jot it all down, so this was just a quick synopsis.
Monday it was back on the ground attacking the other London tourist sites. We started out walking past the Tower of London down to the Tower Bridge and across the other side of the Themes up to the London Bridge and finally taking the tube to King’s Cross station where we promptly headed to the rail lines to get a photo of platform 9 ¾ from the Harry Potter films, dorky, I know, but I just had to get a photo running with my trolley at the wall. That night we headed to Covenant Gardens again to have a great pre-theatre meal at an Indonesian restaurant before heading out to see the musical Chicago. The musical was good, but a bit of a letdown, since the Roxy on our night was brunette and she is supposed to be blonde! Oh well, still a great musical and a fun night.
Tuesday we got up early and headed to the opening day of the state rooms at Buckingham Palace, when the Queen is away, the common folk get to pay to see her digs, and pretend to be a royal guest. I have to say for all the castles, abbeys, palaces that I’ve seen on this trip, and there were many, Buckingham Palace was worth it, they had a phenomenal audio guide tour through the state rooms and gorgeous furnishings inside. We even got to have tea and scones on the back lawn of the Palace, such royalty indeed. As a note the state rooms are only open one month each summer when the Queen is away at her summer house in Scotland, so not many people even get the chance to see them, but if you are ever in London in August I highly recommend, we got lucky, because the Queen left a week early so we were fortunate to see them in July. After the Palace we walked through St. James’ Park to the Horse Guards, the funny suited guards you can take photos with and try to make them laugh or smile (they’re not supposed to, looks like a horrible position having to stand still for so long while people poke fun at you to get you to falter). That evening we met up with family for a wonderful English dinner complete with Pimm’s, Banger’s and Mash and Plum Pie Crumble. It was fun to catch up with family that lives so far away who you haven’t seen in years, and yet feel like you could catch up quickly on everything. It was the perfect ending to our month long trip around the UK, ending with family and delicious traditional food.
