London Day 5 - A Short Stroll in the City (Yeah right!)

Far out!!! 3am!!!

Awake and trying to get back to sleep. By 4am, I was reading my book. It’s going to be a very long day. ☹️

At 5am, I had breakfast, and just after 6am, Sarah joined me.

For our last full day here, we planned to head back into the city and tick off a couple more walking tour sights. We kicked things off with Piccadilly Circus, which was completely underwhelming. In my mind, it was supposed to be a giant roundabout with lots of traffic, but it turns out it’s just a shopping area. Famous for what? I still have no idea. 😂

I should mention how the Aaron and Sarah travel team is operating on this trip so far. Sarah has been in charge of finding accommodation (with a little support from me) and also marks out the main sights to visit on the map. She’s also the final decision-maker on whether something is worth spending entrance fee money on.

My main jobs are logistics and navigation — working out how we get from place to place and organising transport. I’m also chief navigator when we’re out and about. That means we generally don’t get lost — or if we do, we at least know where we are, even if it’s not where we’re supposed to be.

After Piccadilly Circus, we spotted a couple of very tall statues and a column toward the river, so we decided to check them out. One was Florence Nightingale, and the massive column was for the Duke of York — head of the army in the 17th century. A name I can't remember now, and one I’d never heard of before. The King’s brother at the time?

We stumbled onto The Mall again, this time on the opposite side, and also found ourselves on Pall Mall.

Next, we headed to Leicester Square, where there are more shops, a small park, and a statue of William Shakespeare. There was also a cool bronze statue of Harry Potter.

From there, we made our way back to Trafalgar Square, and the 3-on-3 basketball courts had finally been removed, so we could see the fountains and Lord Nelson’s Column, as well as the lions up close. We were 20 minutes early for the gallery opening — we had tickets for 11am but arrived at 9:40am. Time to take a seat and do some people-watching until 10am.

A very friendly young police constable patrolling the square noticed my cap and asked if I was from New Zealand. We had a great chat about the weather and travel. Really nice guy — he’s been a cop for 15 years and looked to be in his mid-30s. He said there are often protests in the square, so it’s an interesting place to patrol, but none today so far.

We queued at the National Gallery and were let in early, despite our tickets being for an hour later. It’s free to enter, but they issue timed tickets to manage visitor numbers. We headed straight for the painting halls to see Van Gogh’s work — still one of my favourites. In the same area were Monet, Cézanne, and Paul Gauguin, who we also like. They even had the original Hay Wain by John Constable, which Mum used to have on the lounge wall — or maybe on placemats — when we were kids.

We’re not art aficionados, so we moved through the halls much more quickly than many others. Our favourite find was the painting below, which had such amazing detail in the subjects’ faces it almost looked like a photo.

Feeling like we’d added enough to our cultural experience for the day, we exited the gallery in search of coffee. There was a Pret A Manger across the square, so we decided to give it a go. It’s a popular coffee franchise we’ve seen all over here. I know manger is the French verb "to eat", so it seemed appropriate that I also have a biscuit with my coffee. Both were yummy. Apparently "Pret a" means ready or available in French so the stores name is "Ready to Eat" in English. 

Two coffees and a large biscuit cost £10.30, so perhaps not the cheapest stop — but I’m sure the real estate around here is expensive, and rent needs paying somehow.

Reinforced with caffeine, sugar, and carbs, I had a cunning plan to extend the walk slightly and visit another famous Monopoly board property — the most expensive one: Mayfair. On the way, we passed Fleet Street.

Mayfair had some very fancy and high-priced shops. I’ll remember a few and forget many more: Tiffany & Co., Louis Vuitton, Cartier, Claridge’s Hotel, Savile Row, and a Gordon Ramsay restaurant thrown in for good measure.

From Mayfair, we threw the dice and ticked off Park Lane as well, which is right by Hyde Park. We walked into the middle of the park as far as the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain — the strangest fountain I’ve ever seen.

By then, our legs were feeling pretty beat up, so we decided to skip Kensington Palace and exited the park to catch the Underground back.

I didn’t have the GPS tracker on today, but my phone’s step counter showed just under 20,000 steps when we got back to the flat. For comparison, we only did 16,000 steps the other day when we walked 11km! A decent walk for sure.

Lunch was leftovers and coffee, followed by more coffee and digestives. Time now to chill, rest the feet, and write up the blog.

Before I forget, the weather has been lovely today. Sunny and mild, without being too hot, all day. Perhaps we have struck a few days of the elusive English summer.

We popped into the Village Inn for a pint before dinner which was nice. Then we went to the Co-op as Sarah needed some potato chips. For dinner we opted to return to the Turkish takeaway. However, this time we made sure not to over order. I had a chicken burger with fries and Sarah had a chicken wrap with fries. The burger wasn't very good but the rest was. Sarah couldn't eat all of her wrap or her fries. They have very generous portions.