Doctor Foster went to Gloucester

In a shower of rain,

He stepped in a puddle,

Right up to his middle,

And never went there again.

Our first hour on the streets of London was mainly composed of rain, a lot of rain. The heavens broke open and demolished all beneath it with such intensity that the road was flooded to a depth of 4-6cm from raindrops the size of golfballs.

The Gloucester Road station was not too far from our hotel, but the rain made it seem a very long walk. As it happened, the best choice was to go for shorts and sandals, and I wish I had brought such attire.

We waited a long time to get our room sorted. The hotel was one of that sort of hotel that bemuses me. It was sort of run-down and populated almost entirely by Easter European people. On reflection, we should have known that a hotel named after an ascetic hermit who lived at the top of a high pole would present us with a challenge. The Hotel was inside one of those gorgeous white houses that populate Kensington, and look like they would cost an absolute fortune.

Our room was exactly one floor higher than I estimated it, no matter how many times I climbed the stairs. The room was small and, for no apparent reason had a double door. Just inside the arc of the front door, there was a second door which fulfilled no obvious purpose, since it was not attached to a wall and could not be a fire door.

Desperately hungry, and slightly sodden, we stepped out to meet the black_robed_one for a bite to eat. It is the nature of all things that meeting him turned into an adventure of its own. We were able to walk down to the Kensington tube station on foot, as we were intent on seeing more than the tiled/postered insides of the London Tube. The City was rather pretty in its freshly-scoured sun-drenched form. About one in every ten shops on each road was closed due to flooding, and another one in five or so had definite signs of the flood.

Young Fanning and I stopped to see the Science Museum, but it was also closed.

London is a gorgeous city. I think it’s particularly apparent when you come from somewhere like Dublin, which is like a smaller provincial version of the same. You can see, when you look at the V&A, how London was the Seat of Empire. There are plenty of buildings in London which Dublin cannot remotely match for size, even when you remove the skyscrapers.

The Black_robed_one had considerable trouble meeting us. From what I remember, he had to take a train, bus, taxi, unicycle and finally a jet-powered, monkey-piloted… well, you get the idea. We three brave men wandered down to have a bite to eat in a Belgian Restaurant, which was expensive but nice.

After some rather uncertain navigation, we met young Kolabear in Camden. There was a lot of standing around and looking at the bizarre fights / police cars / lunatics of Camden while we waited. I figured it was some sort of test, Kola is offically too cool for school now, and his boho-rep was at risk from a bunch of Irish tourists.

On the other hand, he picked an excellent place for a burger. Oh, and I think it’s Edinburgh Castle. This was something of a running issue, particuarly with Fatz, who insisted on calling our stop “Glo-chester Road” because, evidently, he recognises the contribution of every letter individually and completely. Not for the last time, I wept. In his defence it took me a while to discover that “Holborn” has a silent L or that “Stoke-Newington” is pronounced “Hell”.

We got up early the next morning, in order to meet the doughty Xaosseed for a trip to the fabled Borough Market. This proved an excellent choice. To understand the Borough Market, you must think of every craft fair you’ve been to, then cram them together under a cast-iron arched roof and add exactly two and a half times as many people as would be comfortable. It’s definitely advisable to be there early, as the place gets packed later on.

After a lot of wandering and tasting (mmm… cheese and other things), we opted for some truly delicious stuffed rolls. Those of you who have eaten at Gruel on Dame St. will only have the slightest inkling of the wonders of this soft, rich, moist flesh pressed with richly seasoned stuffing in a crisp, yet yielding roll. Worth every penny, especially when eaten with Apple Juice to drink.

I felt rather privileged to have met young Xaosseed at this early hour, as I had been fairly certain that he would have been up all night, dressed as a wizard and fighting with 6-year-olds for a copy of the 7th Potter, Deadly Hollows or something.

The rest of Saturday was an amble around various museums. Xaosseed had a rendez-vous with a femme fatale, and so we left him to it. Kola has explained the details of the world’s slowest Italian, and so I will let that sleeping dog lie.
I don’t know what went on in “Club Fanny”, but from the stunned silence, I can only surmise that noone was spared, not even the children.

We had seen the Natural History Museum on the Friday, and I had driven Black_robed_one to near-insanity looking for Leopluridons. Other museums seen over the weekend included the Science Museum on Sunday and the Tate Modern on Monday (the orange lampposts that guide you there are a genuinely great way to get people there).

The visit to Transformers was a great call. It’s an excellent movie, particularly if you have seen Bad Boys II or Hot Fuzz recently. It’s a re-imagining of the Robots in Disguise through a very heavy lens of the Director (all the Michael Bay classic touches are there, including spinning steady-cam shots, viewed through a haze approaches of vehicles and massive collateral damage to no noticeable human injury).

We decided, rightly as it happened, that we should make our way relatively early out to Stanstead for the journey home. I was very pleased that we did. Even arriving 2 hours early for the flight, we were sequence number 60 for the plane. The real joy happened when we tried to get through the security. A fire alarm had been set off in Stanstead, so they had held up everyone for 30 mins in the queue. The teeming masses of people were, for the most part, depressed and annoyed
though one couple were specifically angry because they had missed their flight. In a typical show of professionalism, the security desk employee turned his employee card around when asked for his name, so the complaint could not be made. Comedy moved to tragedy as they kept a spare lane completely empty, only responding to heavily intoned questions like “what do I have to do to get to that lane?”. We did our best to let the rushing people through, but for the most part they were thwarted by surly employees.

I have become accustomed to pointless security rituals, most of them merely seem pointless, but in this case the procedure was truly farcical. Would-be passengers in Stanstead have to X-ray their shoes separately, after they have milled about in the checked in area on their own. That’s right, you go through one set of security, get to the secure area, then you get your shoes inspected. Truly wacky.

We eventually boarded our plane and headed for home. Ryanair flights are just like buses these days, and that’s fine for short hops such as Lon-Dub. One annoyance was that they switched the lights off and let us all rest for about ten minutes, then suddenly blasted us with commercials and sales pitches. Ouch.

Some tips I have gathered for London that might be useful to future travelling types:

1. Buy an Oyster Card as soon as you can. They let you pay less than 50% of the price of a normal tube fair.
   You don’t need to register for them unless you intend to stay in Britain for good, and the balance is recoverable at
   the end (including the £3.00 deposit).
2. The Dollar / Sterling ATM in Dublin Airport is a ridiculously overpriced convenience. Better to get money almost anywhere else.
3. The Tube is maintained over weekends, so some lines will be shut. It’s worth listening out for that.
4. The British Empire wasn’t won by closing at 6:00pm, but all the Tourist attractions do it anyway.
5. No matter what, you will only get a seat on the tube just before the last stop. Take it anyway, you need the rest.

The complete set of photos can be seen on flickr.

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