Soho

Soho and all that.  Rose wanted to check out a bead shop in Soho, so a walk through Hyde Park was called for. Past Kensington Palace.  Does not seem like a palace, more like a large mansion. Then any old bus going towards Picadilly. Oops, it just made a wrong turn.  Out we get and walk off along Constitution Hill to Buckingham Palace. Just like all the pictures, but as always, different when you actually are there.

Next, a walk through St Jame's Park.  Ooh look: deck chairs. Obviously set out on the grass for us tourists.  Ahhh.  "Excuse me sir, that will be one pound fifty per hour." Tricky bastards, no signs. Through Trafalgar Square, up St  Martin's Lane, past some nicely done theatre facades. I get to prop up a bar stool, while she checks out the bead shop. Hmm. They sell pies for lunch... Back to the bead shop past a really nice looking restaurant called Jamie's.  A bit cheeky catching on to the Jamie Oliver thing.  So we ended up there and thoroughly enjoyed the meal and atmosphere. Then we found out it actually was his restaurant.

Then off to see Rose's sister's son who lives in London.  He came to London twenty years ago for two weeks, and has settled down here.  Dinner with him, his wife and their three month old baby, who slept through an amazing din.

Next day: Museum day. A trudge down through Hyde park past the Serpentine  (a nice long pond/lake) . My cunning plan is to have Rose go to the Victoria and Albert, while I spend two hours in the Natural History.  First, a cup of coffee in the supposedly cute cafe in the V and A.  Yes, very ornate. Well done, whoever.

This is inside the Museum of Natural History:

This is inside the V and A:

There was no queue into the V and A, so I was hoping the same for the Natural History Museum. Nooooo!  One hour in the queue thinking this better be worth it. It was not, for me anyway.  This is not to say that this is not a wonderfully done museum. Just that for my purposes, it was a little disappointing.

My interest was our place in evolution, and they had about 25m of displays of skulls and so on. Maybe it was the lack of time and sore feet.

This is our last night in this hotel, tomorrow we head off to one next to the Albert embankment, which is a lot closer to where the bus tour leaves from.