London is a nice town. Big, fun and impossible to get lost in.

London

Alex and I went to London for our first anniversary on the weekend of the 11th/12th of Feb. We had booked a hotel in Hyde Park, just north of Kensington Gardens by Lancaster Gate a while back and wandered down to Cambridge train station early on Saturday after our repro lecture. After tea on the train, and a queue to end all queues outside Kings Cross station, we had tube tickets and were free to wander anywhere in zone 1. Huzzah! First stop - hotel. Lancaster Gate station smells. This picture does it far too much justice as it has been taken before they ripped all the posters off the walls, and forgets to point out that you have to climb 78 steps to get to ground level. No escalators... and who would risk the lifts :s crazy people.
Anyway, the hotel was beautiful, as can be seen from the photo I took in the rain on the second day, and our room was warm, had an en-suite bathroom and the bed was well comfy. We were in heaven.

So, after bunging our stuff, and getting very excited by the lockable safe (and locking our train tickets, keys and Alex's earrings in it), we went back out into London for an afternoon of discovery! We went to covent garden where we had doughnuts, cake and hot-chocolate, went to Tesco metro (strangely - needed change), and the London Transport shop, where alex bought a beautiful 1920s summer sale poster (nicer than the image suggests). We then had an insane work around trafalgar square, the strand, picadilly circus, the 'NPG darling' and everywhere basically :) Alex was worried we were getting lost until I pointed out that it is impossible to get lost in London. No matter where you are, you are always close to a tube station, and if you don't know which tube station that is, you can get a train to the next one that you do know the name of :) It's amaaaaazing. Anyway, we spent the evening trying to find somewhere for dinner - eventually coming to a lovely Italian place. I had garlic mushrooms (sorry Alex) and canelloni, and Alex had minestrone soup and beautiful spicy pasta thingie. We then had zabaglione for dessert - whipped egg whites with sugar and wine.... *drools*.Following dinner we had another little walk before going back home.

The next morning we woke up to rain :( - but, heads held high we went down to our complimentary (we paid for it :S) breakfast. Croissants, fruit, cereal, coffee... everything. Twas amazing! We then spent the day seeing the sights of London - it was really really lovely. We saw the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain, (see bad mobile phone picture) which is less urinal like in real-life than it appears on telly when everyone is telling you how much it looks like a toilet. We also saw the Prince Albert memorial, the "Statue of Physical Energy" (weird) and Buckingham Palace, before having a yummy pub lunch and coming back home.

An amazing weekend, with an amazing girl :) yaaaaaay.
xxxxxxx