London Day 4: And the rain came down....

We've been in London for almost four days and the rain (and wind) finally made an appearance. Unlike Bermuda, where we were expecting nice weather and didn't get much, we were mentally and physically prepared for total crap weather wise here in London. We were pleasantly surprised by the first three days and expecting today to finally come.

Turned out that it didn't begin to rain until we stood in line at 10am at the TKTS booth at the south end of Leicester Square. 45 minutes and £25 Chicago 4:30 matinee tickets later, we'd changed our plans from a walk through the neighborhoods around Chelsea to a visit to the Victoria & Albert Museum off of the South Kensington Tube station. We joined what seemed like all area schoolchildren and their parents in the looooong walk from the train to the exit (see yesterday's post about the distance from tunnel to train and stairs), but luckily nearly all of them departed for the National History Museum.

The Victoria & Albert was just what we needed on a rainy day for several hours of viewing interesting sculpture, historical artifacts, clothing, painting, furniture and more from the Renaissance, the Reformation, and many other eras in human history. I even tried on a hoop skirt (and tried to sit in it!)

We wandered around downtown for awhile then hopped on a VERY crowded Tube back to Paddington and on to the Bakerloo line for our ride to the flat. W and I stopped at the Tesco again for a refill on soda, beer (Strongbow Cider for me!), sponges for the flat (aka wash ups in the UK), digestive cookies for our friend Katherine, and some afternoon snacks. While waiting outside we noticed a dog barking its head off down the street. Turned out to be a woman having her afternoon tea outside with some Bichon type fuzzy white thing and a shop owner yelling at her about calling the police. It seemed the shop owner and the woman were in disagreement about the dog's behavior and the shop owner wanted her to leave. She refused. Police dispatched. Ahhh...nice to know that people are people no matter where you go.

After a snack and a change of clothes, we took off on a mad dash for the West End and a production of Chicago with a bunch of BBC stars like Ian Kelsey and reality TV stars like Aoife Mulholldand. Not bad for a 4:30 matinee!!! Choreographed by Ann Reinking, one of my heroes, the dancing was great! The only bother was that many of the leads and minor characters kept varying between a slightly Southern / Texan accent and their native Irish / English / Scottish brogues. It seems that the instruction on how to be American includes adopt a twang!!! Otherwise, really nice production!

Spent the rest of the nice at a local hip chain All Bar One. More about that tomorrow. Early day at Portobello Road in Notting Hill tomorrow (in more forecasted rain.) Pictures and details to follow....

We spent the evening after the theatre at All Bar One, a restaurant/bar chain designed specifically to give women a place where they can feel comfortable ordering a drink and having a bite. Open and airy with large seating areas with tables and couches, pillows and stools, this is an obvious 20-30 something locale. One of the oddest things for W and I is the fact that only quite expensive restaurants have table service with waitstaff. Most places like the Porterhouse and All Bar One, while serving decent food, require you to order and pay at the bar. Then based on your table number, typically carved or stickered onto the edge of your table, the staff will deliver your meal. Want another drink? Go back to the bar. We enjoyed several types of beers and some tapas (not real tapas, more lots of little appetizers.) If this is a chain, I'd like to franchise it in the US! One funny moment came when I ordered a 'red beer' for W, intending to receive an amber ale. No such thing really in the UK, at least at All Bar One. Bitters, ales, lagers, ciders, whites - yes. But ask for a red beer in London and you'll get what I got and sent back, a framboise or strawberry flavored beer, much like the Fruli that I enjoyed our first night. While I would have liked it, I had already received my cider so I promptly ordered W a lager. Hilarity inducing for the English lad next to me at the bar. The barkeep was understanding and I was reminded by the observer NOT TO TIP! We sat, ate, drank and people watched for the rest of the evening.