Photos: Furniture from the Victoria and Albert Museum that we liked. A bookcase with a staircase it in from the Architecture exhibition.
Sunday June 20th, 2010
Good Morning came late this morning since we didn't awake until about 8:00. Since we collapsed at 10:00 the previous evening, it was a 10 hour nap. We had tea and these funny chocolate chip baguettes for breakfast in our room as we decided to give the hotel breakfast a rest. Breakfast which is included so no complaints (however, English bacon, sausages, coddled eggs, scrambled eggs, mushrooms, pork and beans and toast...every morning gets a wee bit tiring). After a bite and a shower we set off on some necessary business—Laundry. The hotel does not have one so the desk clerk directed us right to the stop light the left to a sleazy dive of a Laundrette. We filled on large washer and put the money in—everything seemed ok except that the washer didn’t spin quite long enough and our clothes were still very wet when the cycle ended--dripping. We wrang out the water by hand as best we could and started the drying process. A long long process, but in the end our clothes were cleaner and dry. Back to the hotel for a readjustment of stuff and then the bus to Victoria Station for some cash and some lunch. Both were accomplished quickly and easily.
Next task is to find the bus to the Victoria and Albert Museum. We thought we had the right number and the right platform, but the driver informed us no he didn’t go there. We went to the information booth where they had a new guy who was trying to read the same map we had and finally said “I don’t Know.” Then this older fellow opened the door and asked what we needed, Nancy explained to him that the map said this bus went to Knightssbridge and was this correct—he said Americans can’t read maps and abruptly gave us a number and vague directions as to where to get it. At which point Nancy was plenty unhappy. We got there and were ready to get on when some of our fellow travelers pushed Nancy out of the way and boarded ahead of us. This was a very difficult part of our day.
We rode the bus through a ritzy shopping district: Prada, Armani, Gucci and many other exclusive shops with door minders. A very busy and congested area of London. Rode past Harrods and got off across the street from the museum we were seeking.
The Victoria and Albert Museum is a museum about living and decoration—it has tons of weird stuff. We went through the jewelry exhibit that showed styles from pre-roman Britain through the twentieth century. We definitely don’t like the very modern designers very much, and much of the older stuff from Victoria on is very ostentatious. We saw a gallery of miniature portraits including the wife of Sir Thomas Crapper, wife of a Victorian hydraulic engineer. The miniature portraits were painted on very thin slices of ivory. We walked through the British exhibits of furniture, clothing and decoration from the 17th to the 20th century very interesting—boy, did the British upper class have it made.
After the museum we took the bus back to Victoria to a nice quiet restaurant with big glasses of Coca Cola, a reasonable menu, and had a very relaxing dinner. Then home to the room to collapse once more, watch some football, blog and so to bed. Much excitement as tomorrow we see Pete and Jess.
12,440 steps today remember the time sitting in the Launderette waiting for clothes to dry,
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