A Typical Day in London

 Well maybe not so typical because the weather was beautiful. 

We started the day, after the wake up rituals (shower etc), with breakfast at Balan’s Soho Society number 43:

Because it was my first breakfast in London in a while I had the full English and Fran the Omlette

We went back to our hotel (Victory House in Leicester Square) and got tickets to a “Bleak Expectations”, a comedy play kind of making fun of Emily Dickinson’s plays. The play was in Piccadilly Circus.

Then we took the tube over to Borough Market to do a bit of shopping. The map above clearly shows how intuitive it is to get anywhere in London on the tube (it actually is easy to read once you “get it”).

Dropped packages off at the hotel and went to walk around Covent Garden. Did a tiny bit of shopping there - I bought a bow tie. And found a hotdog stand. Seriously did not eat there. No really.

It was mid afternoon and we were getting a bit hungry so we started looking for a Pintxos place we know called PIX but couldn’t find it. But instead we stumbled on the 10 cases. We’ve stumbled on this place at least three other times. We never remember where it is but it’s one of my favorite French Bistro’s anywhere (including France). I’ve finally written down the address so hopefully I can find it next time. We had a light lunch of Rillettes, Cucumber Gazpatcho, and Gouyseres accompanied by a wonderful pour of Chenin Blanc.

We walked London for a while longer before stopping by Balan’s again for a late day Aperitif. Then back to the hotel to freshen up for the play.

We went back (for the third time today)  to Soho to find a quick bite to eat and, low and behold we found PIX! They had moved to Soho and didn’t tell us.  So we got a few Pintxos and, after fighting our way through Chinatown and Piccadilly Circus, we’re ready for the theater.

The play was a fun. A snarky take on Dickinson, entitled “Bleak Expectations”, with a lot of current political humor thrown in. We got home a bit late having to fight crowds in both Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square. By my guess there were more people in those squares than live on all Fidalgo Island. It is a bank holiday in UK so people are out partying.

Most of our days on the road are like this. Our days in London are always like this. It’s why we travel.

We have two days left. I doubt I’ll post much more this trip unless there’s something extraordinary or maybe do a recap of would/wouldn’t do again. It’s really been a blast. Though we miss the kid’s and grandkids, not having work or pet responsibilities makes travel easier for me to enjoy.