UK Trip Part 3: Last days in London

Hey remember that time Ben and I went to the UK like 2 months ago? And how I was going to write all these blog recaps about it? Yeah...that didn't happen.

But I am determined to finish this even if you guys are still reading about it in December. So help me.

Anyway, the day after our Harry Potter adventure, we decided to hit up Westminster Abbey. We went pretty early in the morning and still had to wait in a long line, but it was so worth the wait. I have kind of a thing for churches and cathedrals - St Peter Cathedral in Rome is one of my favorite places I've ever been, and in Japan, India and Thailand I hit up as many temples as humanly possible.

Westminster is not only huge and gorgeous, but it's also home to poet's corner and is the burial site of many famous politicians, musicians, artists etc. Obviously I geeked out over Edward Elgar, Benjamin Britten, GF Handel, Ralph Vaughn Williams, Henry Purcell, and probably others I'm forgetting. The coolest thing about Westminster is that while it is an amazing historical site, it is also a living, breathing part of the city with daily Evensong services, its own choir and an amazing organ. Photos are not allowed inside the cathedral, but I did snap a few shots outside and in the gardens.

Big Ben & Houses of Parlaiment

Westminster Abbey - and the long line to get in...

Walking towards the courtyards just outside the cathedral

After Westminster, we took a walk through the city and past Buckingham Palace, stopping for some cheesy tourist shots along the way. Mostly I hate being a cheesy tourist but sometimes I kind of love it, when the occasion arises.

I guess everyone must have thought the baby was coming THAT DAY, because there were huge crowds around Buckingham Palace who looked like they were waiting for something really exciting to happen. This is why I do not have a picture of BP...too many people standing in front of it and I couldn't get a good shot :/

British things!!!

Ben pointing to Big Ben...super cheesy

Also cheesy - the obligatory phone booth shot

After our royal jaunt we walked to the New Globe theater! Again, a piece of history that's also a living, breathing part of the city. This might have been my favorite site we saw in London - it helped that our tour guide was AMAZING and I wish I remembered her name so I could give her a rave review. She was awesome.

Obviously the New Globe is not the same building as the original Globe - actually it's not even in the same place, just basically nearby in the same neighborhood. And, since the original Globe burned down we don't even really know what it looked like, so the New Globe is an approximation of what the Globe *probably* looked like, based on writings from the time which described the theater, and from looking at the design of other theaters built in the same time period. Whatever, it is awesome. I wish we had been able to see a show there, but sadly no time :/

Putting up the set for their upcoming show

Seats in the New Globe

After the Globe, we went back to our hotel, showered and changed and took the train to St John for our 2-year anniversary dinner! A friend from work recommended St John because of their Bone Marrow dishes - Ben is a huuuuuuge fan of bone marrow (I really like it too, but he is basically obsessed) and based on the website and reviews it looked like our kind of place. We shared a bone marrow salad for our appetizer - not even a salad, basically bone marrow that you spread on toast, and then put some greenery on top of which I guess is the 'salad' part. I really love how they served it - they literally bring out this plate with four huge bones, and you have to dig the marrow out with a tiny fork. It sounds disgusting but is actually kind of awesome. I didn't get a photo and I'd feel bad stealing someone else's but if you look for 'St John London bone marrow salad' in google images, you'll see what I mean. For our mains I had a rabbit dish and Ben had some sort of delicious sausage concoction, and we split a Raspberry Fool for desert. YUM.

We had to catch the train to York the following afternoon, but before heading to King's Cross, we dedicated the morning to the second of our three favorite British things (the first being Harry Potter obviously) - Sherlock Holmes!!  First, the Sherlock Holmes Museum on Baker Street:

YAAAAY

221B Baker Street

Where all of the deductions took place, allegedly. Because Holmes and Watson were totally real people right...?

Antique books int he living room

Hats and a pipe, just waiting for their owners to return...

Sherlock's favorite pastime - beekeping!

Next, we headed to the site of BBC Sherlock's '221B Baker Street' which is not on Baker Street at all, but is the street/house they use for filming. I cleverly dubbed this site 'Faker Street'...just take a minute to marvel at my genius.

Moving on.

Speedy's cafe is a real place, and there are probably actual people who live in '221B' and I'm sure those people are sick of random tourists and Sherlock Holmes-obsessed nutcases such as myself taking ridiculous photos in front of their door, but too bad for them.

Speedy's!!

Wonder if anyone's home??

Sadly, after Faker street it was time to say goodbye to London. We packed our bags, took the underground to King's Cross, and hopped on a train to York - but not before taking one last cheesy Harry Potter-themed photo:

Can I take the Hogwarts Express instead...?

And no, that barrier is not actually between platforms 9 and 10...I think it was between 4 and 5 which was where we had to be to catch our train. We were running on a tight schedule and didn't have time to go too far out of our way, so this will have to do.

Next up (er, the next time I get around to writing a recap post) - York!

UK Trip Part 2: Harry Potter, Yoga and ...bugers

Uggghhh...obviously I did not intend to go this long before my next trip post, but things just got out of hand. It has been a crazy couple of weeks since we returned to the US, in a lot of ways. As I should have expected, work pretty much blew up on me and a couple of decisions that were made in my absence have had disastrous consequences. DISASTROUS. Not like, world ending disastrous...just...very time consuming for myself and others. Yesterday at 9am I was literally quintuple booked with meetings.

Now I know why Hermione needed that time turner.

SPEAKING OF

GUESS WHAT WE DID IN LONDON

If you guessed the WB Harry Potter movie studio tour YOU ARE CORRECT SIR.

As you may or may not be aware, I really, really love Harry Potter. Like, have read all of the books multiple times and analyzed them at length with friends, re-watch the films regularly, own a wand and have a mini-Hagrid on my desk at work. Two years ago, Ben and I took a road trip to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando, and as soon as I heard about the studio tour opening near London I immediately added it to my bucket list.

We woke up bright and early, had breakfast at the hotel, and caught a train to Watford. From there we hopped on a bus to the studio for our 10am tour. Obviously, I was excited.

OMG HARRY POTTER
The face only HP can inspire

One of the first things I saw, outside before the tour even started, was a display of the giant chess pieces used in the first film! They are actually huge and look SUPER COOL even out of context.

The first stop on the actual tour was the Hogwarts entrance and the great hall! I took SO many pictures on the tour, so I tried to include only my favorite shots. I'll stop yammering now and let the photos speak for themselves but if you're an HP fan I'm sure you'll appreciate a lot of these :)

Fake McGonagall and Dumbledore

The Fat Lady! (Early version)

McGonagall's portrait in Gryffindor Common Room...one of those things
I never noticed in the films but now that I know it's there,
I'll be looking for it ;)

DUMBLEDORE'S OFFICE

Umbridge's office at the Ministry of Magic...this might have actually been my favorite set

THE BRIDGE!! This was the set piece I was probably most excited for.
So many meaningful conversations happened on that bridge...le sigh

OMG BRIDGE

Diagon Alley, obviously

Sketches

THIS was maybe the coolest thing I have ever seen. This model of Hogwarts was used for pretty much all exterior shots of the castle. And it is HUUUUGE. 50 feet across!!!

Hogwarts at night

The tour was so cool. Where the theme park in Orlando aims to make you feel like you've turned the corner and stepped into the magical world of Harry Potter (at least, as much as you can in 90-degree weather surrounded by other tourists), the studio tour is really about the magic of filmmaking. There is intention behind every set piece, every prop and every detail which is partly why the world comes alive on film. Nothing is by accident, and nothing is filler or random. Even the book covers and papers are actually written out (and very clever if you read the fine print). The OWL exams even had actual questions! I just loved seeing how much love went into making the HP movies, and the next time I watch them it will be with different eyes.

After the tour, we bussed/trained it back to London (a few dollars poorer, but having gained a scarf, two keychains and a small poster advertising the Quidditch World Cup). Back at the hotel we changed, relaxed for a bit and then hopped on the underground to catch an evening yoga class.

I surveyed the Asana Junkies FB group for studio suggestions in London and couple of people mentioned TriYoga. I signed up for a 6pm class with Aki Omori, and as soon as she pulled a life-size plastic skeleton out of the corner and started talking about the SI joint I knew I had come to the right place!

Yogaaaa

After class we walked to Soho and wandered around looking for a good place to eat. It was one of those nights where I was so hungry that I didn't really have any specific cravings, but I was pretty sure that I'd know what I wanted when I saw it. Apparently what I wanted was greasy fried things and a milkshake. And some Elvis lovin'.

THE BREAKFAST CLUB

Suddenly feeling the need to watch Lilo and Stitch again

The Breakfast Club was a great find - one of our favorite dinners from the trip! Partly because we found it on our own just by wandering, and partly because the food/shakes were delightful. I had a veggie burger with fries, and Ben had a fish sandwich. After stuffing our faces, we went book browsing!

All the books!

And then, we took a small detour. If you recognize this building and if you understand why I am standing in front of it making a sad face, you are now my best friend. If you do NOT recognize this building, you need to watch the entire series of SHERLOCK immediately.
Just do it.
Do it for the children.

Womp womp

Well that's all I have the energy to write at the moment. Back with more soon! I get to work from home tomorrow, so that's exciting. 

UK Trip Part 1: Mumford and Sons & Tower of London

WOW do I have some catching up to do! I wanted to blog while I was travelling and do a semi-real-time trip account, but our internet connection was never strong enough to upload photos so I decided to just wait until we got back.

So without further ado, trip blog!

We left MN at 9:45pm on July 5th and arrived in London at about noon on the 6th. Unfortunately, it turned out that our hotel was about one billion miles from the airport and there were a ton of road closures so we ended up with an almost two hour cab ride right out of the gate. It was really expensive....welcome to London!

We stayed at the Holday Inn Stratford which is right next to Olympic Park. This ended up being a great location - Stratford isn't very central in and of itself, but Olympic Park is right next to Stratford Station which is on both the Central and Jubilee lines, so you can get to most places quickly and without having to transfer.

Anywho, the cab let us out a couple of blocks from the hotel, and we proceeded to haul our bags up a lift (escalator) and through the massive crowds of people who had suddenly descended into the vicinity of our hotel.

"Wow," I thought. "This seems really crowded, even for a Saturday night." Then I noticed people in uniforms directing traffic and deduced that there was obviously some sort of event taking place that night. And THEN I heard a loudspeaker announcement instruct people to "Keep to the right for Mumford and Sons."

WHAAAAA...??

Obviously I wasted no time in figuring out what exactly was going on. As it turned out there was a music festival that night, in Olympic Park, featuring Mumford and Sons. Opening bands included Ben Howard, Vampire Weekend and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. Umm, yes please.

After I had finished freaking out and convincing Ben that we HAD to go to this concert (he readily agreed, although was admittedly a bit skeptical of our ability to stay up that late) we checked in at the hotel, dumped our bags in the room, and ran down to the street to see if we could find tickets. Do not shower or wash face, do not change clothes, do not collect $200. Gross, admittedly...but less gross considering we were about to spend the next several hours outside, in the grass, jumping around with bare feet (or maybe more gross? Also the jumping was mostly just me....). We may or may not have taken turns napping on the ground between sets.

The concert was AMAZING. All of the bands were fantastic, and I was super excited to see Mumford and Sons since I probably won't be able to make it to their show in St Paul.



On the way to the concert - tickets in hand!



YAAAY



MUMFORD AND SONSSSS

The next morning, we got up early and had breakfast before heading over to the Tower of London. Since it was the weekend, we knew it would be crowded so we wanted to get there right when they opened to avoid as much of the crowd as possible.

The tower still houses the crown jewels, but has also been used as a fortress, the royal palace, a prison, and armory among other things. There are tons of creepy and weird stories about the tower - two young princes were (likely) murdered there in the late 1400's, and apparently Anne Boleyn's ghost is still running amok.

Outside the Tower of London

Demonstrating how to use a Trebuchet (this is a small-scale version...about 1/3 size)

Duly noted!

Dragon made of armor and weponry! So cool.

After a couple of hours at the Tower, we walked down to St Katherine's pier for lunch at the Dickens Inn, which was recommended to me by a coworker who used to live in London. The Dickens inn is a great spot - they have a pub on the ground floor, pizza on the middle floor and a fancy-ish restaurant on the top. My colleague highly recommended the pizza, so Ben and I shared a small pie with prosciutto, olives and arugala with a salad on the side. It was delicious! Definitely recommended, plus St Katherine's is a cute area and fun to walk around in.

The Dickens Inn

Mmmm pizza

After lunch we wandered around for a bit before heading back to the hotel. We both went for a quick afternoon run and showered, then caught a train to Soho for some dinner and bookshop browsing. Unfortunately everything closes early on Sundays so we didn't get to do much shopping, but we did find a nice dinner spot: Maison Touareg, a Lebanese and Moroccan restaurant on Greek Street. I ordered the Veg Tagine, and Ben had a Chicken Couscous...to drink I had wine and Ben had a mocktail. The man loves his mocktails...and I love to make fun of his mocktails.

Maison Touareg

Mocktails - the real man's drink!



So that covers the first couple days of our trip - I'll be back with more hopefully tomorrow! We've been back since Saturday but have pretty much hit the ground running with work, vet appointments for the pets and other various nonsense but I will get caught up soon :)

Hope you're all having a great week!!