There and Back Again

(ring-ring) Hello, UK! My weekend trip to London with Shane proved to be a success. We stayed at a nice, friendly hostel and got to see the major sites together...we ended up seeing way more things than we thought we were capable of! Of course, I have way more pictures, but I couldn´t upload them all, so here are some of the best ones.
There was no question about it. I HAD to get a pic of myself standing in one of the traditional phone booths...don´t I look like Bridget Jones? heheheh Yeah right...maybe if I practised my accent a little more (ahem hem hem) a-la-constipated-Queen-style. ;)
Shane picked me up at the airport with beautiful yellow flowers, one of which I still have pressed in paper (it still looks pretty, awww). From there, we took the "tube" (they don´t say metro) to our hostal, which took about one hour! Wow, I don´t know if Heathrow is really that far away from London Central or if our hostal was (Lambeth North), but wowzers.

Like I said before, our hostal was great: the people were friendly, we had breakfast included in the price, and everything was clean..."Journey´s Inn", you have my vote of approval, along with Shane´s. Also, our hostal wasn´t too far away from the giant sight-seeing wheel (this isn´t the view from out hostal, but since I´m talking about it...). We didn´t decide to go on the wheel, since it cost a lot and went REALLY slow...we figured we might as well walk and take in as much we could, since our stay was short.

We had decent weather on Friday and Saturday,
except that Saturday evening was REALLY cold (you know that sort of damp cold that goes in your bones? yeah, that one). Shane and I were walking all over the place, and by the end of the day were chilled to the bone...brrr London sure ain´t as warm as Logroño! What a temperature difference..
This picture is of the War Museum which was about 2 minutes away from our hostal. I didn´t have time to go inside, but Shane did. It looked pretty impresive from the outside, to say the least.



I love this picture. To me, it just encompasses everything in one single shot. I especially like the crooked lamp on the left side. Oh, Big Ben, you sure are big! I do have some close-ups as well, but I still prefer this shot. You can see the old fashioned taxis a little bit on the bottom as well.
It was a grey day overall, but not too cold at this point...thank God we had a nice hearty breakfast at the hostal to carry us through our long trek through jolly old England. :)




Here we have her...Buckingham Palace. I tried to get the whole building in, but it was a little hard...I actually climbed the ginormous statue facing it to get a better shot (but to no avail..you can´t climb it too much anyways). I also took various pics of the gate and everything, and more close-ups, but I here´s the overall feel of it. Shane and I tried to get a close-up of the british flag, but the wind was weak so it was hard to get a good shot. So many people! While I was there I tried to imagine the havoc that must have ensued here when Diana passed away...



LOVE IT! All taxis in London are old-fashioned (except they are partially "destroyed" by advertisements plastered all over them). When I took this picture, Shane and I were looking for a cute little café, and when I saw one parked right where we were standing I got all excited and took this chef-d´oeuvre. The Red and Black are kinda nice together, no?
On another note, speaking of advertisements is making me think of graffiti. All over London, there are signs saying "To Let".....now guess what missing letter somebody spray painted in the middle of that sign. Yup. LOVE IT AGAIN!
Ask Shane for the pic ;)


Shakespeare´s Globe Theatre. This pic was taken on the day that I was leaving...so we didn´t have time for a tour (although Shane took a tour the next day and loved it). The tour was 40 minutes apparently. Well, it looks pretty impressive from the outside, the door of the Globe Theatre was open and I tried to sneek in a shot, but it was raining and it was too far away to see anything. I´m sure Shane has some good pics of that. We did go to the Tate Modern Museum together afterwards, and that was cool...lots of great art. It was a nice way to escape the rain.



Ah, Shane...thank you so much for a wonderful trip, I will never forget it! You and I have the best of adventures together (so many spanish memories as well, eh?). Now you are in Australia, and maybe we will see each other there this summer...(crosses fingers).
Shane and I saw Trafalgar Square, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, Tate Modern Museum, Portobello Market (great market where Shane bought me a giant yummy chocolate Truffle), Globe Theatre, London Bridge, and we just walked everywhere downtown! I don´t remember all the names, but I just had an awesome time. Hahaha even though we were in England we went to an Indian restaurant on the Friday night (sooooo good! We asked the waiter for their business card) and on the Saturday we went to a Vietnamese restaurant (so-so...I was feeling a little sick that night, which thank God quickly passed).
I took this pic of Shane when we were warming ourselves up in a little coffee shop called Nero. It´s a great coffee place, kinda reminds me of UK´s answer to Second Cup (although there are PLENTY of god-awful Starbucks). On the other side of the street was a little sign that was barely noticeable. It read "Charles Dickens used to work here as a child". I thought that was pretty neat...I barely missed the sign, too.
Shane and I had planned on going to see "Guys and Dolls" or "The Producers", but unfortunately everything was sold out or they just had single seats avalaible. It would have been fun seeing a musical together, but I´m sure we´ll catch up on that someday. We actually enjoyed a quiet classical rehearsal, on the Saturday afternoon, in a little church (forget the name!) when we wanted to warm up. It was pretty soothing, and very nice...the group was rehearsing Vivaldi for a concert that they were holding later that night. We got a free preview, he he he...
So, all in all it was an incredible weekend trip that went, of course, far too fast. I had such an amazing time, and it was nice to spend time together with Shane. Everything was worth it, and I am still amazed that we did this. I am happy what we are both doing...now he is in Australia and will live so many crazy and fun adventures of his own! I´m proud of him, I´m sure that he´ll have a great 2006 in Oz. We are both in different parts of the world, and 10 hours apart, but we are doing what is best for us and will only have great stories to tell each other in the end.
(smiles)
Anybody wanna come and meet me somewhere in Europe? I´m up for another weekend trip..how about somewhere in Greece or Italy? :)