The End of the Journey

We had four days in London to just rest, relax, and regroup. Our first night we had an interesting dinner experience. We had wandered around Putney (just across the bridge from where we were staying) and were looking for a place for dinner. We settled on Putney Pies, as we have a deep affection for meat pies! It looked fun, and claimed to be the best pie shop in the UK. Well, the food was good but the place was weird, chaotic, and a little uncomfortable. The server kept apologizing for all kinds of things, including complaints about the chef's inability to read an order. (He did get mine wrong.) The owner and the barkeep were all over the place and the owner was putting away a lot of ale. That crew looked like the Putney motorcycle gang had just taken up residence.  The owners car was illegally parked across the street, and he kept going over there. It was all quite unsettling. Not a place to which we will return.

The next day we walked along the Thames on a beautiful part of the Thames Path. You'll see the signs all over London along the river. It's not continuous (it's a long river with a lot going on!), but is a wonderful walkway wherever it is. We noted, as we looked across to Putney, that this seems to be the rowing club section of the London Thames. Boathouses everywhere, and at noon time there were lots of crews training. They looked like high school students - doubles, fours, and eights.

This part of the Thames path goes along the Bishop's Park, part of the grounds of Fulham Palace. Fulham Palace is the former home of the bishops of London, the last having lived here as recently as 1963. The community has taken it over and, with money from the UK Lottery which funds a ton of stuff, has a wonderful history and community center. We walked through it (a free thing) and especially enjoyed the walled garden, again with tons of things still blooming! You can read all about Fulham Palace at their website: www.fulhampalace.org. 

There are some wonderful modern paintings of the bishops over the years by a Swedish artist named Kenneth Andersson. Here's one of his whimsical pieces:

Larry had left his camera at the flat, so we walked back so he could get it back and take flower pictures in the walled garden. I headed off to the Putney Bridge Tube station to top off our Oyster cards so we 'd be ready for adventures the next day. On my way back, I took a different route and walked by a commemorative plaque in the pavement marking the regular rowing competition between Oxford and Cambridge which takes place each year at Putney.

When we met up again at the flat, we headed out for a lovely pub meal at the Boathouse in Putney.

The next day was very rainy and bleak, but we set off to see the Chelsea Physic Garden. This tiny bit of acreage along the Thames started life as the place where the apothecaries in London came to get plants for medications. It is a very wonderful little garden. I had visited here in 2013, but Larry had never been and we had an enjoyable time. They have docents who do free tours, and the leader of ours was excellent. We truly enjoy visiting all these places where there are volunteers who simply love the place and the topic. Their passion shows and makes it all the more enjoyable for us.

The small crisis on this day was the fact that my phone was all locked up, and even thought I know how to do a hard reset on my iPhone, it wasn't working. So, after a nice tea and sweet and the purchase of our dinner at Partridges in the Duke of York Square, and the requisite walk through Peter Jones, we headed off to the Apple store on Regent Street. Both Oxford Street and Regent Street were totally crowded and the Apple store was just jammed. But a very helpful young Apple clerk in his lovely grey shirt (much nicer than the blue ones at University Village) got my phone started again and we were on our way. It was just enough to get back on the Tube before rush hour and head back to our lovely flat. Dinner was the Shepherd's Pie we bought at Partridges and the next episode in the new Lewis season.

On Wednesday we headed  out again to do some shopping - back to Regent Street to Hamley's for treats for Lucca and Nico. Larry had not been there and was amazed at this huge and energetic toy store. From there we went to the British Museum for lunch and for our reserved time to see the exhibit Celts; Art and Identity. It was a perfect coda to our trip. As we saw the ways in which the Celts made their way from ancient Turkey and Hungary across Europe to the now identified Celtic places, I couldn't help wondering how the Syrian migrants will shape Europe now.

We ended the day, this last night on our trip,  with dinner at Ruth Rogers' River Cafe. This is a very famous restaurant, and it did not disappoint. We had a fabulous experience all around. It was lovely that we could walk to it from our flat - about a mile.

On Thursday morning we got up early to pack up and take our suitcases upstairs to our landlady for storage. Then we headed off on the massively packed rush hour tube to Islington for coffee with dear friend Alastair Hume. It was great fun as always, and we were happy to have that brief time with him.  He shared with us the news of the death of David Willcocks,  noted King's College Choir director (among many others things.) There will be a memorial at King's on 22 November. Alastair will be playing his string bass for the orchestra assembled.

We arrived back at the flat just in time for the arrival of our car to the airport. The whole timing was just right, and soon we were winging our way back to Seattle after a really wonderful trip.