LONDON - All in 1

SORRY ABOUT THE LONG POST - limited time to break them into separate posts

ENGLAND – DAY 1 and 2 - RUGBY
So I made it out of America and started the flight over to London where they had had snow and lots of it and didn’t know what to do… I was so relieved to not be flying with American Airlines again. I was over it!

I was sitting on the edge in the centre three seats and there was a girl sitting on the other end with nobody in the middle – My Lucky Day! Not because of the girl but because of the space and the possibility to sit with my feet on the seat. Anyway we started talking and discovered we were both in New York for the same reasons – To see shows. She was on her way back home to London where she was working on sound for The Lions King . I didn’t get free tickets  Anyway as would later turn out I would have felt bad telling her how bad the show was if I actually met up with her at the show or she did organize tickets… Anyway, our spare seat was quickly taken by a photographer who was on his way back to Kenya to have an interview to work at the World Cup. It was such a great flight because it was the first one since I left that I actually talked to the people I was sitting next to. Let me rephrase that, this was the first time people had talked back to me!

I eventually arrived in Heathrow and had the biggest grilling from customs / immigration that I had had my whole flight…

ACM (Angry Customs Man): What are you doing here
ME (Me): On Holidays

ACM: How long are you staying?
ME: About a week

ACM: That isn’t very definite. I can see you are leaving next Sunday
ME: (inner thought) Then why did you ask that question?
ME: (actually said) Yeah, Next Sunday morning.

ACM: Who are you staying with?
ME: (inner thought) read the card I just handed you with that on!
ME: (actually said) A family friend

ACM: How long has this ‘friend’ known you
ME: (inner thought) do I tell the truth?
ME: (actually said) about 25 years

ACM: but your not even that old!
ME: (inner thought) DUDE, Can you not count? Did you miss math at school to take extra “how to be annoying lectures”
ME: (actually said nothing – was waiting for him to realize!)

ACM: (redoing the math in his head…) so you met this person when you were born
ME: (inner thought) Yeah, I actually have a photographic memory and remember every doctor that was at the hospital and nurse and every visitor mum had!
ME: (actually said) A sudo Uncle. My Dad’s best friend so yeah, known me for ages

ACM: How much money do you expect to spend here?
ME: (inner thought) do you want to see the receipts from what I just spent in New York…
ME: (actually said) about 800 bucks ( I knew the English twat wouldn’t know what that meant)

ACM: (vacant look on his face and trying to change the subject but still in an angry voice) Why did you choose to come here in the coldest Winter we have had in 30 years?
ME: (inner thought) Actually, I have been planning this trip for the last 25 years but wanted to wait until it was really really cold and snowy and I knew the city would just shut down and it would be a waste of my time coming here
ME: (actually said) It was part of a round the world trip and I was in Niagara a week ago where we had about two feet of snow over night so a little snow won’t worry me!

ACM: Where are you off to after you leave here?
ME (actually said before inner thought happened) to that address in Rugby (pointing at my green slip)

ACM: NO, when you leave London
ME: (inner thought) I knew that’s what you meant but this game is still fun and I haven’t pushed too many buttons yet!
ME: (actually said) Back home to Brisbane

ACM: aren’t you going to Singapore?
ME: (inner thought) why do you keep asking me questions that you already know the answer to?
ME: (actually said) yeah – got 8 hour stop over in Singapore

ACM: Do you plan on doing any other touring into Europe while you are here
ME: (inner thought) unless they are showing Broadway Musicals somewhere else the answer is NO!
ME: (actually said) No, not this time. I plan on coming back and doing some more touring on another trip.

CM: (we dropped the A because he turned into every other customs person at this point…) Thank you, Enjoy your stay.
ME: (inner thought) so you can be nice
ME: (actually said) Cheers Mate, Have A Great Day!

And that is the end of Angry Customs Man!

So Hillary met me and we headed up to Rugby. There was so much snow everywhere! I had a little power nap due to the fact I had now been away for about 30 hours… Then Martin and I headed out to explore some of the sights of Rugby. We drove past the school where Rugby started and had a look at downtown Rugby. It is a large country town – large compared to a lot of the other places but still a small town really.

Then it was out for dinner and then home for an early night. Not before trying Mulled Wine – a wine that is designed to be drunk warm – a complete opposite from the ice wine I had been drinking about a week early.

After Hillary thinking I may have died during the night because it was about 11:30am when I finally woke up... Martin and I planned the day. We were going to head out to Shakespeare’s home town. We headed out via Warwick and saw the castle there and then headed out to Strafford. We found an old tudor style house that you could tour through and it gave a really good history of the style and the era. The amazing thing was how cold this house was – the poor people without their reverse cycle or their gas heaters… We checked out (from the outside only) the Shakespeare theatre. Only the outside because it is undergoing a major referb and they are putting in a new theatre or two.

Then it was getting cold, and dark – it was only 4:30pm – so we headed back to Rugby. Had some dinner and then sat down to some TV – the perfect Sunday evening and the perfect way to end my little stay in Rugby.


MONDAY - LONDON
The train from Rugby takes about 2 hours so it was a great time to catch up on some blog updates from New York! and some How I Met Your Mother episodes. I would have liked to look at the countryside abut most of it was covered in snow so it wasn’t anything too different from all of the snow photos I had taken. And it was all white.

The plan in London was to catch up with Rob. A mate from School. He has been over there for about 3 years now and is currently teaching geography at a boys school near Westminster. I got into Euston train station at about 2:00pm, and was able to leave my suitcase there while I went out and explored London for a couple of hours as Rob didn’t finish work until about 5:30pm.

SO I headed down to Leister Square. I knew this would be somewhere to get familiar with over the next couple of days as it was also ‘Theatre Land’. I then kept heading south. Past the museum, through Trafalgar Square, down a big important looking street. I walked through a little arch way and found myself in a giant open park. So I kept walking and then started to get scared as I saw two armoured guards and realised that that was Number 10 Downing Street. I kept walking and found ‘Big Ben’. And then kept heading down and found the Lambeth Bridge. So I walked over it – does that count as doing the Lambeth Walk? I headed along ‘South Bank’ up to the London Eye. It was already getting dark so I decided to maybe wait for a better day…It was then a walk across the Westminster Bridge and heading down to Victoria tube station to meet Rob. Outside Victoria station is Billy Elliot and Wicked!

Rob’s flatmates had people staying as well this week so there was a shortage of beds so we went out and bought an airbed from one of the most random shops. You go in to the front shop and look through the catalogue, choose your product – only knowing what it is from the description and the tiny picture in the catalogue. ANYWAY, you then have to go to a machine where you enter the code of the product and your credit card. You get a receipt and a counter to go to. You then wait and from the giant storeroom in the back your product magically eventually appears.

After a trip back to Euston to pick up my bag we headed to Clapham Common where Rob is now living. London is know for its Indian restaurants so Rob and I headed out to find one and some dinner. As it turns out there was one just around the corner, and to make it better it was really really yum.

And that is day one in London!

TUESDAY – LONDON
With no fancy vouchers and no people handing out half price vouchers on the streets, I headed out to find the TKTS booth to see what offers were available. Once again, I had pretty good luck turning up a couple of hours before the show and only being a single person I managed to get some really good seats. London had more to offer in the form of Matinee’s which was good because it meant I could catch up with Rob at night time. Jersey Boys or Phantom was my matinee choice and I chose Jersey Boys – kind of glad I did! I think if you aren’t going to see Anthony Warlow is there actually any point seeing Phantom?

I explored Theatreland a little bit more as this would be where I would be spending the next couple of days and I found the coolest shop in the world. This shop is dedicated to theatre Cd’s Dvd, music scores, old programs, memobillia as well as possibly the entire collection of Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Sammy Davis Jnr… etc Cd’s. I could have spent every day and every dollar at this shop!

Anyway, I was excited to find a Pizza Hut for lunch! They have the restaurant here! Woo Hoo! This was actually more exciting because of the salad bar rather than the Pizza but the Pizza was an added bonus. As I have mentioned before, fresh fruit and vegetables can be hard to find so a salad bar was very exciting! SO much lettuce, corn, pineapple, beetroot, carrot… YUM YUM YUM.

Anyway, after the show I met up with Rob again and we had a walk through Soho before finding a nice Italian Restaurant for dinner.


WEDNESDAY – LONDON
It is snowing today! Yay Yay Yay! AS if I hadn’t had enough of it in Chicago, Toronto, Montréal, Niagara, Toronto, New York… Rob was hoping for a snow day but wasn’t that lucky so he went off to work and I headed out to The Lion King. The Lion King was near Covent Garden. So it was a good chance to explore that area today. I passed / found the SAVOY THEATRE. I didn’t take a photo because you actually couldn’t see it. The Savoy is down a little alleyway and is getting a major outside reform at the moment so it just would have been a picture of scaffolding! Out of interest, Legally Blonde I on there at the moment…

Anyway, the markets were great to walk around and explore. I found a string quartet that were playing but everything was so so so fast. Canon in D is normally about 4 minutes in its entiriety – just under 3 minutes with every repeat. The Can Can was really impressive as well! With it still snowing outside I headed into a pub and ordered a super traditional English meal – BANGERS AND MASH!

I then kept exploring the markets and garden area. Just like your normal markets but at least it was undercover and out of the snow!

After the disappointment that was The Lion King, I was planning to meet Rob for dinner before we both went to Avenue Q. The only problem was my mobile phone battery died! So it was an interesting process of charging my phone via my laptop enough to get robs number from my phone to then use a pay phone to try and contact him… anyway – we did find each other and found a bar for a couple of pre dinner drinks then found a great steak restaurant and then it was off to Avenue Q! Even better the second time round!

Day 3 in London had been done. One really disappointing show and one that was fantastic so it almost evened itself out!

It was strait home after the show as I was going to be doing a walking tour tomorrow . It was called The Beatles Magical Muster Tour and it would go to all of the famous Beatles sights in London.


THURSDAY – LONDON
I went to bed last night with the greatest intensions for today. However, my legs and feet and everything was starting to get sore. A combination of lots of walking, lots of sitting in uncomfortable theatre seats, sleeping on an air bed (which was actually quite good). So the walk didn’t happen as the thought of walking to the tube was an effort today! It also didn’t help that I woke up at 10am and needed to be in the city by 11am…

Anyway, today there was a matinee of Blood Brothers on and I was really keen to see it, so I did! I went through TKTS and was only able to get a balcony seat. That didn’t worry me too much – until I got to the theatre and discovered that everyone else up there was a school student. SO a quick trip back to the Box office and I was 8 rows from the front in the centre and didn’t have to pay to upgrade!

I also discovered a little street that was music heaven. There were shops dedicated to selling certain instruments. An Accoustic Guitar Shop, a Bass guitar shop, a saxophone and woodwind shop, a classical music CD shop, a sheet music shop, a keyboard shop, an old rockers shop selling only 50’s and 60’s style records. The list goes on! I resisted the urge to spend more money! Congratulations Matthew!

Blood Brothers was a late matinee (3:00pm) so I stil had a little bit of time to kill so I found a café for lunch and tried to keep as up to date as possible with the blogging!

After a depressing, but good, couple of hours in Blood Brothers, I needed a pick me up and Pricilla was just the ticket. I had achieved my 5 shows in London and 5 shows in New York! I had remembered from Sydney that the Balcony is actually the best place to see Pricilla from! And I was correct!

There are no matinees tomorrow and Rob has organised dinner plans so that will probably be it for shows for me. I have some places I wouldn’t mind trying to fit isn such as: Buckingham Palace, Royal Albert Hall, London Eye, Theatre History Muesum… LOTS to fit in!


FRIDAY - LONDON
I had all these great ideas for today. The first place was a tour of Lords Cricket ground! I had planned to do the midday tour but took a wrong turn out of the subway and got there about 20 minutes late so I had to wait until the 2:00pm tour. The problem with Lords is it is in the middle of nowhere. It doesn’t really have anything around it so I managed to waste some time in the Lords shop and then found a sandwich bar just round the corner. Anyway, I made it to the 2pm tour. WOW. This was fantastic. The whole history of the ashes, going into the Long Room in the Pavillion, both team change rooms and the media box! The greatest sight – apart from the actual real ashes, was to see Lords covered in snow! It was incredible. The whole field – except for the pitch was snow.

Anyway, after this tour was finished it was now 4:15pm and starting to get dark. So I headed back to meet up with Rob. We were going by the overground train because it was easier from where we were to where we were going. The only problem was we may or may not have missed our station so ended up a little further away than initially planed… Anyway, we were heading to the Tate Gallery. Not for the art but for the bar up on top and the view looking out onto St Pauls cathedral. It was then a walk over the millennium bridge (very similar to the Goodwill Bridge) and a bus to convent garden to find a Mexican tapas restaurant. We arrived there at about 9:15pm and were told there was about an hour and a half wait… we found a Thai restaurant. Tonights dinner, apart from being my last one in London, was to meet Rob’s girlfriend Kate.

After dinner, Rob and I headed to another bar that was very crowded so it was then home for a good night sleep. We had lots to fit in tomorrow before I got on the train back to Rugby.

LONDON - SATURDAY
Today was what I thought was a typical London Day! Wet, Raining, Overcast – perfect weather for walking out in the rain at the markets! We headed out first for breakfast then up to the Camden markets. It was like your typical markets but I was in London! Rob and I managed to spend a couple of hours walking around, bought some trashy souvenirs etc.

We then headed into Kings Cross Station / St Pancrius station. This is where the Eurostar leaves and they also have the most amazing Champagne bar in the world! I also caught up with Michelle who had done a couple of shows with Savs and Sunnybank. She is now over there full time doing a theatre course. Unfortunately 4:46pm had arrived and this signalled the end of London!

A couple of hours later and I was back up in Rugby. Martin picked me up and after a quick stopover at his place for a shower and to get Hillary, we headed out to meet a friend of Martin’s – Terry. We then all headed out for a real country pub meal!

After dinner, it was home time and time to pack. I now have an extra 12kg of stuff that I didn’t bring with me – music books and programs add up! Anyway… the trip is now pretty much over. Just a trip to Heathrow in the morning and then a 12 hour flight to Singapore then 8 hours in Singapore then 8 hour flight back into Brisbane.