London trip - Day 3

Day 3 of my trip revolves around the kensington district. Woke up a tab bit late , and heard from my aunt that theres a sale at Harrods over at kensington. So we decided to pop by there to grab some stuff.

The store was huge and very classy too.Well stocked goods from all over the world. The pastries looks like decorative items and its so nice i wouldn't be able to eat it! Some rules that you should know before going in is that all haversack should be hand carried. no bermudas or slippers theres security guard at the door to remind you of that.

We went straight to the house brand souvenir section looking at the purses , bags , key chain, mugs etc some very good deal due to the sale. Got a few stuff there and was quite contented.
Next stop is the Victoria and Albert museum along crowell road, Filled with art works such as metalworks , musical instruments , paintings, glass , architectures and sculptures through the ages. Quite a eye opener for all of us.

Nice art installation at the entrance foyer

The twin roman towers

More sculptures below!

Around the corner we had a quick bite at one of the south Kensington tube stations cafeteria. Ordered jeff fav jacket potato( nothing beats a UK jacket potato) and salad soo healthy i must say.

Just next to the museum is another British natural history museum. This one place is awesome you get up close to a real dinosaur well almost just the bones.. and robotic dinosaurs. The stuffed animals looks cool at the same time creepy if you get my drift. The over hanging life size whale and dolphin is one of the most photographed!

Watch out for the fishes behind you!


Thats a large SPERM whale ! wonder how they mate

Charles darwin part time job as a cleaner

Just next to it is the Geological museum that touches on how earth was formed, earthquakes and other natural disaster. The rock formation and types .. the list goes on..

Rushed back to richmond had dinner with my aunt and family before heading down to catch the performance "Ladysalsa" at the theatre . I must say it was quite fun and interactive too. The dancers from cuba are pretty cool and so is the 10 piece band and the 2 lead singers.

One way to sum up the days activity.. educational haha

London trip - Day 4

Due to timing constrant we reshuffle some schedule, and push ahead the visit to roman bath and stonehedge to this day. Woke up early for the trip to both stonehedge at salisbury and bath will be a long one.
Had a quick bite at about 9am before leaving the house. thankfully roshane , plotted out the direction to stonehedge for our first stop which is about an hour away from London. We also have to thanks to the car inbuilt GPS to navigate the roads.
The stonehedge is at the junction of 2 inter crossing road, well you can chose to pay a price to enter the ground or stand behind the fence to admire it. But we chose to enter the ground, unfortunately you can't touch the stones . They have cordon the area , fortunately i have my zoom lens to take pictures upclose.
Next stop is to bath west of stonehedge. On the way we got ourself some strawberry along the roadside which is freshly plucked. My uncle joke saying that depends on what car you drive they will sell you at different price ( unfortunately for us we drove a merc). Almost drove to the wrong direction thankfully we realised it and did a hasty turn around.

It tooks us longer time then expected to reach bath, After parking the car at corn street. We headed to mcdonalds for a quick meal. Seems like something is wrong with the airconditioner there. Hastily we made our way to the main attraction , which is the roman baths.
The roman baths is built by the romans during the roman occupation of britain. Anyway you can see how the romans enjoy hot spa in the pass. unfortunately the bath is no longer safe to use due to the use of lead pipe to pipe in the water into the pool. Lots of archaeological finds from and around the bath are displayed in the museum.

All visitor can get to try the spring water from the restuarant but we kinda missed out on that. my uncle decide to get some "evidence" of this trip back to my aunt i believe it was some teacup from the shop next to the bath house.
Along the way i got arrested by the city roman guard but thankfully i got release for good behavior.
Next stop is the pulteney bridge which really is a shopping mall bridge with shops on both side of the bridge.

On reaching the carpark, we notice a note clipped on to the wiper and it wrote "Did you dropped a camera ? please call me XXXXXXXX" . Only at that moment i realised my pocket camera is missing! We called the person immediately unfortunately when we got hold of her we had already hit the highway. So she is kind enough to send us the camera via mail, thats mighty nice of her.

And thats conclude our day 4 of the trip.

London trip - Day 5

Woke up early today and requested my uncle not to cook as we are going out to have a traditional breakfast alfresco along Richmond. Breakfast was bacon , grill tomato, 2 slice of toast, sausage and eggs.Our adventure today covers the thames riverside, starting from westminster tube station. Shops selling souvenirs fill the streets and tourist from all over the world took pictures and video of the iconic Big Ben.


Our first Stop is the London eye. Hmm wonder why they call it eye when it looked nothing like one.

Trust me this over size ferris wheel is huge, the picture above does not do justice to it. ticket was 14 pounds for 1 revolution of about 30mins. Well it was kind of drizzling so the picture wasn't that fantastic
The capsule can sit probably about 12 people. We tried stepping out of the capsule but ermm the glass is blocking us.After ending our ride, we had a dilemma now ryan want to view the starwars exhibition at the county hall (he's a hard core fan) while jeff want to catch the giant whale shark (which he heard they have) at the london aquarium. In the end we decide to split up to catch more sights , as for me i kind of into star wars so i tag along with ryan.

At starwars exhibition you get to see life size movie props (starfighter, pod racer, R2D2 ,C3PO etc) costumes and models used in the movie. There are occasion when folks in stormtrooper , imperial guards and darth vader drop by and greet visitors in the exhibition. Thankfully he did use his force on us, surely we would not survive.

Thats me getting out of the flying car, while ryan snapping away.







To think you are in london, this statue makes you wonder where you really are. egypt?










Its after walking awhile that we realised its time for lunch!.. Whats better then to have a beer at Doggett's Coat & Badge a pub next to thames.








I had fish and chips in battered beer , sausage and mash, and for the brave one the kidney pudding! .. the taste of that is extreme..









After a session of posing to the camera.













Time for us to trudge on to our next stop the tate modern, which houses some of the fine modern art works from present and past artist. Currently they are exhibiting works by Dali, but that you have to pay to enter. We choose to see the other free exhibition instead...













Took about 2 hours inside , due to time constraint we had to move on to our next and final destination which is the Globe theatre but unfortunately it is closed for the day. In the end we have to settle for some gelatto , before preparing to return back for a sumptuous.

London trip - Day 6

Feeling unaccomplished , as the Shakespeare globe theatre was closed for the day. We got up early in the morning , and took a early train there. And alas we are the first feel to get in. guided tour to the main theater starts about 10.30am. So we linger around the museum for a while. Learnt alot about the theatre itself.

1st floor

The tour got us outside the replica globe theatre , the original one has been burnt down long time ago. Globe theatre is a an open air theatre that is entirely made of wood and built without a single nail! but with some modern technology ( like the wood treated with fire retardant chemical) .

2nd floor

There was a rehearsal while we were having the tour and the group was playing with some authentic classical instrument. Truly an eye opener for us!

Walking further down Thames river we noticed a excavated site of the winchester palace along southwark. Then lo and behold a authentic replica medieval ship the golden hind appear infront of us . Looks cool i must say.


After so much walking we decided to take a tea break at the southwark cathedral reflectory which serves cakes and coffee.

Next stop we headed across London bridge to the tower of london for more sightseeing. Getting hungry we had our meals at the fastfood fish and chip joint and a great deal i must say but don't expect great tasting food.

Got into the castle but decided to hang around the entrance for the start of the guided tour by yeoman warden. Yeoman warden are caretakers for the London tower for centuries and they are retired sergeant majors from army these days. During the tour yeoman warden corrected some of most common mistake made by tourist and even locals "Thames" is not prononced as tha-mes but Tam-es ! bet you didnt know that eh! We get to hear alot of storys of betray, executions and love stories too during the tour
As you can see the number of people attending the guided tour is insane. At first glance i say probably abt 50 or more people! so i back out and did some of my own exploration.

Watched a change of guard parade (their hats look like beavers hehe)

Took photos of the raven , who is said to be the protector of the crown empire. If they are gone so is the empire, that is why till this day they are still breed behind the castle walls.

Lots of actors in period costume roams the ground giving special guided tour which of course you have to donate at the end of the tour.


There are loads of photo opportunities for photographers like me, as the castle is huge.

We visited the armory tower, the crown jewelry vote which has travellator built in it thats a first for a museum. Got to see the huge vault use to keep the crown jewelry at night. Each door is over 2 tons! Closing that could be a problem. We tried out the unused medieval lavatory in the castle basically the excrement goes through a hole in the wall and straight into the moat which would be fill up on high tide and carried out into the river. yucks!

After london tower we visited the tower bridge. which was one of the most famous icon of london. Got to witness a ship passing through the draw bridge quite a sight.

The rest went in for the exhibition while i decided to give it a miss. Instead took some photos like this of my self standing in between the gap of the drawbridge.
I Loitered for about 40mins or so the guys came out and we head straight back base. For my uncle and aunt bought us to tooting borough for a sumptuous authentic indian meal at this restaurant Lahore , Waiting time was about 20 mins can see how popular that is.

Jeff looking at the award

And thats sums up the day back to food!