Metallica goes to London!

I’ve been in London for five days now and have seen a lot of the city. When I arrived Saturday morning, I was met at the airport by a friend of a friend, Mary and Julian and their two little children Rose and Peter. I visited their home in the suburbs (Barnes) and we walked across the common to have lunch at a pub named the Red Lion (I think). It was very English feeling which was just what I wanted for my first meal. Then they took me to my hotel downtown, in Covent Garden. Thankfully it is a nice hotel. Since I booked on the internet I was a little afraid of how it would turn out but it is very nice indeed and has worked out well. By the time I got to my room it was around 4 or 5 and I had been up for about 24 hours. I took a bath and went to bed; I didn’t even bother to eat dinner. Then I woke up at 3am, yay jet lag!

Sunday I just wandered around on foot, checking out the nearby neighborhoods. I had lunch at a famous old pub named the Lamb and Flag. In the afternoon I went to the National Gallery, and then my feet were too sore to do anything else except take a nap. For dinner I ate at a ridiculous place I stumbled across called Cagney’s, where all the dishes were named after things James Cagney said or movies he was in. Weird.

On Monday I met up with Mary again (I figured out how to take a train to their house, which I was proud of) and we went to Kew Gardens, which were really beautiful. After that I went to Kensington Palace and had afternoon tea at the Orangery there. Afternoon tea is really a delightful idea. Then I walked through the Kensington Gardens and took the tube back. I’ve been lucky to have amazingly nice weather all week.

The next day I slept REALLY late (@#*$ jet lag!) and in the afternoon took the tube over to the Tower of London. That has been my favorite thing so far; it was first built in 1066 and has so much amazing history attached to it. I took a tour with a Yeoman Warder, they are nicknamed Beefeaters and yes that is how the gin got that name; if you look at the bottle you’ll see a picture of one. Who knew? For dinner I met up with another friend of a friend, Bob, and two of her friends. We had a drink on the south bank and then went to a nice little Thai restaurant where I got to have green curry with tofu, yum. It was such a pleasure to be able to have dinner with someone after spending so much time alone. I don’t mind being my myself all day, but it’s hard to eat dinner alone in a restaurant day after day.

Today I went on a bus tour of the city, which I really should have done much earlier, but that’s just how things worked out. It was nice though because it kinda pulled together all the pieces that I had seen and put them together into a coherent whole. Also I finally got some shots of Big Ben and the houses of Parliament. Then for lunch, the long-awaited fish and chips! I purposely investigated online to make sure I was going to a really good spot. Luckily there is one very close to my hotel and dang it was gooooood. It puts Austin places like the Dog and Duck and Opal’s to shame.

Tomorrow Mark and the band finally get to England and Mark is going to meet up with me in town for the day. Hopefully we’ll take a ride up in the London Eye. Then we’re off on the tour bus to the music festival in Minehead! I’ll post all my pictures on Flickr or somewhere when I get back.