Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Country Mice in the City

Picadilly Circus


'Birthday Cakes' and Cocktails

Outside Her Majesty's Theatre at the Phantom of the Opera

Hello! Yesterday (Tuesday/Laura's Golden Birthday) was a blast - we had a good time running around London. After breakfast we headed to Leicester Square and bought tickets for the 7:30 p.m. Phantom of the Opera Show. Then we found TopShop... weak dollar be damned, we don't care! This shop had excellent cheap clothes (by London standards) so it was like regular shopping in the States. Laura is wearing her pretty new shirt today. Then we stumbled upon Trafalgar Square and saw all kinds of neat historical things. There were giant lion statues that Nan tried to ride on, but she didn't have proper foot gear to climb up on the lion, so she petted it instead.



Then we hit Chinatown and SoHo. Soho was an experience. Now we can say we've seen it. We were deliriously hungry by dinner time (LOTS of walking) and found a cute little restaurant in Covent Garden. Nan keeps trying to call it Covenant Garden. Looks like her Catholicism is paying off.



Nan accused Laura of 'becoming British' when Laura told her to "stop lolligagging in the streets. You're going to get hit." Who says lolligagging?



After dinner we headed to Phantom of the Opera. We had front row seats, it was awesome! Laura was fortunate enough not to get beamed by the flying chandelier. We could peer over the edge and see the orchestra in the pit below us. It was a wonderful performance.



Afterwards, we headed to a little bar and had drinks. Unfortunately, the place was no longer serving 'afters' (desserts). Nan was hell-bent on getting Laura some type of birthday dessert. She found a little Italian place that wrapped up some desserts to go. Nan returned to the bar with the afters and we sat outside at a picnic table and enjoyed them. Some nice Austalians crashed our birthday party. They sang happy birthday to Laura, and called us 'Bloody Yanks.'



Next up: today Stonehenge and Bath!!



Things to note:



Weather: Awesome and sunny so far! Possible rain showers are forecast for Friday, our day we have tickets to Wimbledon!! So say a little prayer that we have good weather and are able to watch Venus and Roger play.



The Tube: We've mastered it! We feel like locals. Almost. No eye contact with anyone, and stick to the right on the escalator unless you're in a hurry so people can pass on the left. And everyone in London is in a hurry. We figure we spend 23% of each day in the Underground system. Everytime we surface from the Tube we high-five for making another successful journey, but then immediately get lost on the streets above ground.



Jet Lag: This is worth noting! We're proud of the fact that we adapted right away to the local time, and didn't waste anytime suffering from the dreaded jet-lag. Laura even got up 4 times during our first night and was raring to go. Nan made her go back to bed.



Tea: the tea at our hotel is really good! But we have yet to experience afternoon, or high, tea.



Off to Stonehenge and Bath!



Love,

Laura and Nan

3 comments:

Lauren said...

You guys crack me up. I to tried to climb that lion but had to settle for just sitting nicely near him. Have you seen and been in Harrods yet? Dodi Fiad's dad owns it and it is the most amazing department store in the world. Also, it is a lovely place to get tea. At night the whole building is in lights, very pretty. When you're in liverpool can you stop in and check on dave's mom...just kidding. I love the blog. I feel like I'm there. I'm having a park ranger day.

Erica said...

You girls are hilarious. I take some satifaction in knowing what you guys are up to on a daily basis after not having had any contact in many months:-)

You have fun and I look forward to reading about the rest of your adventures...

Happy belated birthday Laura!!

Adam said...

Look at you! Happy Birthday!