We left on Monday afternoon and headed to the airport for a short hour and a half flight. The airport was a little hairy but once we got on the plane everything was fine. I really like flying Lufthansa because they offer actual alcohol to economy class.
This is my glass of wine and the remains of my snack :-)
We treated ourselves to the Heathrow Express train, which takes 15 minutes from airport to Paddington station. Then we walked to our hotel.
At this point I was in a state of culture shock: while it was really cool to see all English everywhere (I knew ALL OF THE WORDS!) and have to look in a different direction when crossing the street, what I was not expecting was to walk out of Paddington station to see several groups of Arabs, many in full dress. I guess I didn't do my research - according to BBC London, there are more than half a million Arabs living in the UK. Nothing wrong with that per se, just really unexpected.
But I digress. We got to our hotel, the Doubletree at Marble Arch, and were pleased to find we were upgraded to a suite. And not just any suite - the Cavendish.
Oh, the Cavendish. You're not a suite, you're a loft apartment. You have an upstairs and downstairs!
While very nice, it also included these iPod click-wheel type things on the wall and despite many attempts, it was always stuffy sleeping and wouldn't get colder unless we opened the windows. (And for a place with such high-tech items, the wifi was pretty disappointing).
Anyway, after checking in we were pretty hungry. First we decided to walk around a nearby department store: Selfridges & Co. For those that don't know, London is all about the huge department stores and they do them really well, in part because they all include the "Food Hall." It's basically a huge floor with different food departments (similar to a food court but on steroids) around the outskirts, and then in the middle a ton of other things to buy, like high end grocery items. It was definitely a highlight to check these out.
Selfridges is huge. I was a little overwhelmed, seeing as how I haven't been in a big store like this in the longest time. We did what we could, saw these sparkly shoes....
And decided it was finally time for dinner. We went to Roti Chai, an Indian place half a block from the hotel that was supposed to be good. And it was, oh it was. Hubby got a spicy bbq chicken sandwich dish (with lots of red onions, his favorite) and I got a lamb curry- we shared a spiked chai drink too, and samosas to start, of course. Everything was so so good! Ack, I want to go back!
The next day we got up and got our hotel breakfast which was pretty nice - you could order off the menu in addition to the buffet so I went for the Eggs Benedict. It just felt more likely ordering it in London than in the US, for obvious reasons. There was also tea to drink.
After hanging out by London Bridge, Tower of London, and Tower Bridge...
...We made our way over to the Bank of England Museum, which was really interesting. We looked at old money, checked out the new notes and its security features, and even got to hold a real bar of gold!
Just so you know, they're really heavy! Sadly it was under a lot of surveillance and ropes so we couldn't lift it up more than a few inches, nor could you take pictures. But take my word for it.
We decided to get a little bite to eat and settled on a meat pie: I got a cheese and onion and hubby got the steak and ale. With mashed potatoes, of course! Just the thing to warm us up on a cool and chilly day. (Sorry for the lack of picture - we ate these pretty fast)
We saw a few more sights including Big Ben (and heard it, neat) and Westminster Abbey.
Oh and the red telephone booths. Don't look at me like that, hubby!
Still killing time, we decided to walk through St. James's Park, which was overrun with birds. Giant ducks among other things.
Finally, it was time for our afternoon tea :-) Delicious.
We were totally stuffed from all the food, we couldn't finish all the sweets. Hubby got his beloved Earl Grey and I got the Assam, both nice and strong. (Note to self for next time: no need to have a bite between breakfast and afternoon tea - there was that much food).
To try and walk this off, we walked over to Trafalgur Square. Found some cool art...
...saw St. Martin-in-the-Fields...
And hey, wait a minute - George Washington, what are you doing here?
According to the inscription, it's a gift from the Commonwealth of Virginia (just Virginia). How sentimental. Hubby told me that Washington vowed never to set foot in England again, so this was sent along with Virginia soil to lay down once it arrived. Ha.
Later we stopped at M&M World, a four-level store devoted to M&Ms. Holy cow was it crowded.
We spent more time walking around and eventually got to Fortnum and Mason, a huge department store/foodie paradise. We got some tea, jam, and even some new fancy shaving cream for the hubby.
On our way back to the hotel, I wanted to get some Pinkberry, my favorite frozen yogurt from back in the states. The closest one to us in Germany is in London. Luckily, it's in the same shopping area as Selfridges, which was close to our hotel.
I can't tell you how delicious this was - I haven't had it since the end of June! Oh yum.
We also picked up a few more pies for dinner (yup -ate frozen yogurt first, yeah vacation!). We both got this amazing lamb, chickpea and chorizo blend, half price since they were closing up, too! Score. We took it back to the hotel and watched some Netflix.
This was a really packed day so we were exhausted. Did I mention that since we were in the UK, I told hubby he had to switch sides of the bed, too? Good thing it was a king-size and neither one of us rolled off.
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