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david
and carol
Our Magnificent
Journey | Chapter 1 | Europe 1999 | London, Paris, Venice, Florence |
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Early risers today, we enjoyed another "perfectly
typical" English breakfast (see Monday) and then set out
once again for Covent Gardens. |
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A few shops were open already, and the stalls
in the Covent Garden Market were being prepared for the day.
We discovered the unbelievably fragrant "Lush," which
we both fell in love with - handmade soaps, masks, facial treatments,
foot lotions, everything with which to pamper one's self. The
marketing was amazing - the theme was "food," and there
were large colorful loaves and wheels of many different kinds
of soaps, some with banana scents, some with seaweed - a veritable
smorgasbord for the senses. Lush's three floors were set up with
wonderful samples and eye-catching signs, and some of their products
were displayed in salad bar types of arrangements, with silver
bowls of masks and cremes set upon large bins of ice. Masterful
marketing. Many products did smell edible. Tried a few samples
and bought some banana soap and some bath bombs and a container
of a facial mask. |
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Exploring the Market, I found a cigar store
that would ship Cuban cigars to me by removing the Cuban bands,
mailing them separately, and replacing them on the cigars with
Nicaraguan bands. Tempting… |
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Went into a shop containing complex animated
wooden and paper "models." Strolled among the many
stalls, and wished we had more time to spend here. This was to
be the last day of our magnificent journey, our last full day
in London and Europe. Sigh… Already the depression was setting
in with a vengeance. |
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It was an unusually gorgeous, sunny, warm
day (no Florentine black leather jackets today,) and we decided
to take the Tube to Kensingston. We got off the Tube and rested
beneath some ancient shade trees near an old stone church, then
began to climb up towards Notting Hill. |
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We found a café that was opening up,
and sat outside and had a coke and coffee. As we sat there people-watching,
our favorite pastime, a woman came by carrying a basket and tripped
and went flying, face first, seemingly in slow motion, to the
pavement. I rushed over to help her up, and she was alright,
although very much embarrassed. Fortunately she had no cuts or
wounds, only slightly damaged pride. She thanked me and continued
on her way. Carol had been stumbling the whole trip, and just
that day had counted four near-falls, and had taken to hanging
securely onto my arm. We had seen an older woman in Firenze take
a similar fall, and she had bruises on her face. |
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We (carefully) walked up to Bayswater Road
and went east to the Kensington Park Gardens, strolled leisurely
amongst the tall old shady oak trees, watched the people playing
with their dogs (no goddam leash laws in Europe it seems,) saw
lovers embracing on the grass in the sun, and slowly made our
way to adjacent Hyde Park, with its serene Serpentine Lake and
grassy knolls. |
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We sat in the shade by the lake and watched
the world go slowly by. A group near us was toasting plastic
glasses of white wine. People were paddle-boating out on the
calm lake. It was very serene, peaceful, pastoral, and beautiful,
and we just sat on the cool grass, soaking it all in, for about
half an hour. |
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Then we walked to Speaker's Corner, at the
northeast corner of Hyde Park where, on Sundays, all are welcome
to get up on soapboxes and speak their minds and suffer the reactions
of the crowds. On the way, however, I stopped at a public W.C.
where I saw yet another poster warning of the dangers of suspicious
packages and offering suggestions of actions to take if such
a "package" is discovered. I thought a clever anti-bombing
slogan would be "Bombs Away…" |
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We took the pedestrian walkway under Bayswater
Road, where I snapped a photo of a sign saying "Beware of
Pickpockets," and we laughed, remembering our episode in
Paris. |
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Entering onto busy, bustling Oxford Street,
we saw that we were close to Selfridges, so we went into the
food court there and immediately knew that we were in Culinary
Heaven. The entire section was enormous and dotted with wine
sections, beer sections, ale sections, cheese sections, olive
sections, herring sections, meat sections, seafood sections,
each section having more selections than the eye could behold.
We sampled as much as we could, and ended up buying fresh bread,
English Stilton cheese, a Welsh mustard and fennel cheese, different
kinds of olives, herrings and a bottle of Beaujolais wine which
a wonderfully delightful gentleman offered to chill and uncork
for us. We were going to have our picnic after all! |
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Hauling our picnic tidbits out of vast Selfridges
(it is hard to decide which we liked more - Harrod's or Selfridges
- Selfridges seemed just a notch below Harrod's in its class
and clientele,) we strolled to a nearby park. We walked around
the entire block of the park, but each gate was locked, so we
walked a few blocks across Oxford Street to a nice shady park
near the American Embassy. Near us was a statue of Franklin Roosevelt
and we had the company of dozens of pigeons and quite a few people,
some obviously workers on their lunch break. Had a marvelously
relaxing hour-long picnic, and Carol was happy. We fed the pigeons,
even though it is not encouraged, and in short, totally enjoyed
ourselves under a large shady oak tree. |
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Apres-picnic we walked back over to Oxford
Street and took the Bond Street Tube Central Line to Holston,
where we switched to the Picadilly Line Tube to Russell Square.
We bought boxes of Scottish shortbread cookies to take home,
then walked the few last blocks to the Hotel Bloomsbury, where
we rested for a while. |
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The last day of our Magnificent Journey -
Europe 1999 was winding down and we were quite sad, reflecting
on the magic days we had enjoyed. After resting we dressed and
went out say our farewells to the wonderful, historical, beautifully
majestic city that is London. Is it still my favorite city on
the planet? Perhaps, but Paris is a close second… |
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Had one last pint of ale at our neighboring
Swan, and traded email addresses with Darshana, the sweet young
South African barmaid. Wished her well in her endeavors, then
walked around the corner to another quaint and oh-so-English
pub called "Friend At Hand" - the sign above the entrance
was a picture of a man trapped in the snow being rescued by a
faithful St. Bernard. Here we had our last Guinness and joked
with Chris, the young bartender, who took a fashion to two young
ladies sitting near us. Carol acted as the "yenta,"
and made introductions. It turns out that poor young Chris has
recently broken up with his "bird," and was "sniffing
about." We took pictures of Chris, and he took one of us,
then we said our cheerios and walked back towards the hotel. |
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Stopped at the Indian restaurant Chambeli
(146 Southampton Row,) where we had an excellent spicy dinner
($52 U.S.) of very generous portions too large for us to finish.
After the delicious dinner, we walked the remaining block back
to the hotel and fell into our soft, short, cozy bed. A loud
thunderstorm in the middle of the night was refreshing, and I
could hear the echoes of the thunder reverberating off ancient
English walls throughout the sleeping city. |
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copyright 1998 / david
and carol lehrman / all rights reserved |
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email david@davidandcarol.com |
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