A Week of Plenty.

With our trip to Brussels looming, we managed to pack plenty in this week starting on Thursday night with the Long Shorts Programme of the London International Animation Festival. The programme included animations over 10 minutes in length, being shown in a seperate session in order to maximise the number of shorter films included in the other programmes. The programme included an Academy Award winning animation, The Danish Poet, and a Sundance Award winning animation, Everything Will Be Ok. It was amazing to be able to see part of an international festival, just minutes from our home.

On Saturday morning we hopped on the tube and headed west to Canary Wharf. Alighting the Underground at the Foster designed station in the heart of the regenerated docklands, we wandered the new centre of commerce in London before catching the Docklands Light Rail to Cutty Sark. The Cutty Sark is a ship, the remains of which are usually able to be visited, however it's currently under restoration and having no prior knowledge about the ship, I'm no better off having not be able to visit it. Beside the Cutty Sark is the Royal Naval Academy, an impressive group of buildings designed by Christopher Wren on the site of Greenwich Palace. The amazing painted hall was open to visit and a truly incredible display of the grandeur contained within the academy.

The Painted Hall at the Royal Naval Academy.

Just minutes walk from the Cutty Sark is Greenwich and the Royal Observatory, home to Greenwich Mean Time and the Prime Meridian. The Prime Meridian is longitude 0, and the defining border of the east and west hemispheres. On display are many astrological and nautical devices, including all four Harrisons, the first watches to be accurate enough on a ship to allow the calculation of a ship's position longitudinally. Also at the Royal Observatory is the "time ball" a large red metal sphere which drops along a rod every day at exactly 1pm GMT. Despite the simplicity of the display, its use as a constant point of reference for ships to set their timepieces was invaluable to the safety of many sailors.

The Prime Meridan.

Following a short walk through Greenwich, we arrived at Laban, a dance college designed by Herzog and De Meuron. The wonderfully resolved building is a highly impressive piece of modern architecture. With curves whose faceted windows reflect the building itself and angular, simple landscaping to accompany the geometry, Laban is awe inspiring architecture. We left Laban to find a bus to catch to another striking piece of contemporary architecture. Set behind a traditional high street, Peckham Library is disjunctive, peeking above the terraces with its copper cladding and orange disc. Somehow Will Alsop convinced Peckham council that the library should be set some three stories above an open public plaza. All that touches the ground is a narrow core, allowing lift and stair access.

Laban's Faceted Windows.

Laban's Main Facade.

Peckham Library.

Having had quite an intrepid day trecking around the city, we returned home to ready ourselves for dinner at Cocoon. Located on Regent St in a heritage building, Cocoon's slick interior makes dining here a pleasant juxtaposition. With its tasty Japanese menu, our dinner was a delight, and left us with a very short walk home.


Sunday we headed north to Hampstead and its impressive public park, Hampstead Heath. Hampstead Heath is a wonderfully huge park, parts of which seem to have retained their natural state, while others follow a more traditional park of rolling grass and hills. One of the heath's high points, Parliament Hill, has a great view over London to the south.

The View from Parliament Hill Across London.

Nearby Highgate Cemetery is home to such names as Karl Marx and Douglas Adams and so we made our way there. The company which began, owned and operated Highgate Cemetery was created by the authorities to deal with the growing needs of London. Seven cemeteries were created in this way in the 1830's which are now known as the "Magnificent Seven". The cemeteries were a huge success right up until the early 20th century when demand for ornate memorials dried up and the company walked away from the cemetery, leaving it without maintenance for 50 years. When the company finally was declared bankrupt and the land was to be sold, a charitable group formed to try and save the cemetery. Luckily they were successful and currently some £300,000 is raised each year just to maintain it in it's current state. Visiting Highgate has been one of the highlights of my time here so far.

Highgate Cemetery.

Highgate Cemetery.

Following our return from Highgate, we ventured to a nearby pub for a quick meal before returning to Curzon for the final session in the London International Animation Festival, the Best of the Festival programme. Voted on by the public attending the session, and including the prize winners, this Sunday night session allowed us the chance to see some incredible animations, and to hear that Everything Will Be Ok won the overall award for best animation. A great end to a busy weekend, we look forward to our short week (public holiday! woohoo!) and impending trip to Belgium next weekend, which is coincidentally the National Belgium Beer Weekend....


And so, I shall close by blog this week, with my updated map link again...

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=108781270355512035411.000001130555522820954&ll=51.511734,-0.125656&spn=0.160465,0.456619&t=h&z=12&om=1

Super Happy Double Mega Fun Post....

Hey all, following my slackness last week, I must make up by covering two weeks in the one post. As such, I shall attempt to be brief and to the point...but we all know there's little chance of that happening.

So, just days after our afternoon tea at Yauatcha (you remember that, right?), Sally and I ventured to what was once the King's Cross Cinema, but is now known as Scala. The incredible Scala (think Thebbie Theatre, but on a smaller scale) was venue to The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster, self proclaimed gothabillies who play a great show. As their first show in London for almost two years, there was a great vibe to both the crowd and the band.

The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster in Full Flight.

The rest of the week was unfortunately taken up with the work and other such mundane tasks, which made our lazy Saturday all the more pleasurable. Following farewell drinks for one of Sally's colleagues on Friday night, we felt is was wise to take it easy. Our Sunday however, began with a quick touch of shopping on Oxford St before heading to The Charles Lamb for a tasty Sunday lunch. Following lunch we wandered along the Regent's Canal from Islington to Camden Lock. Visiting Camden is certainly an experience, the markets there are massive and full of every variety of stall imagineable.

Lunch At The Charles Lamb.

One of the Locks in Regent's Canal

Camden High St on Sunday.

This week (yes, we've only just now reached this week) has seen slightly fewer activities, due in part to the hustle and bustle of busy work, but also due to some less pleasant weather. This weekend was our promming weekend. Now being about halfway through the proms season, we thought it a good idea to take advantage of the passes which give you access to all of the proms playing at the Royal Albert Hall over the weekend. This weekend that covered four concerts, one on Friday night, two on Saturday night and one on Sunday night. With a hard week, we decided that getting across town to the Friday night show was just too much, so we focussed our efforts on Saturday night. The first of the two concerts on Saturday was the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra playing Elgar, and it was amazing. The Royal Albert Hall is one of the most beautiful concert halls in the world, and to be seeing a prom there was an awesome experience. With the second concert starting late, we chose to head home rather than wait it out.

The Birmingham Symphony Orchestra on Stage at the Royal Albert Hall.

The Royal Albert Hall.

The Royal Albert Hall.

Sunday night's concert was one that interested us, and that we were looking forward to seeing. That plan was however dashed, when I decided to to wash my jeans...with both our tickets in the back pocket. Genius. Luckily to brighten our spirits, today our tickets for the Proms In The Park arrived. The last night of the Proms is an event for which to even apply to get a ticket to, you have to have bought tickets to 6 other proms throughout the season, and even then it sells out months and months beforehand. Proms in the Park is an open air concert in Hyde Park, showing the concert in Royal Albert Hall with additional bands and presented by Terry Wogan.


As per usual, I've updated my map, you'll see a link to it at the top of the page, but for those too lazy to scroll, here it is;

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=108781270355512035411.000001130555522820954&ll=51.512482,-0.146942&spn=0.080124,0.22831&z=13&om=1


So that's it for this entry, I'll try and be more diligent and post regularly, but with a long weekend coming up, there's a good chance I'll be late again!

Short but oh so sweet.

Following our recent exciting trip to Edinburgh, this week has been a relatively relaxing and quiet period. The working week passed again without incident, bringing the weekend to us just in time.

Saturday morning we made the moderate walk from home to Borough Markets to collect our weekly produce. Following this we made our way home to drop off the food and have some lunch before heading to Saville Row. Hailing from Adelaide, I found it quite amazing to see shops such as Donna Karen and Vivienne Westwood along side the multitude of incredible tailors that line the streets.


On Sunday morning we made another trek across the river to the Hayward Gallery to see the Anthony Gormley exhibition, Blind Light. Gormley's work deals with the space of people, both the space they take up, and the space around them, including that most variable, personal space. One of the major pieces, called Blind Light, is a large glass room filled with water vapour, much like a cloud. As you enter the space, you lose almost all sense of orientation, your sight is limited to just a few centimeters in front of you (which ends up with many near misses as the other occupants suddenly appear in the mist). Along with many other pieces which explore similar ideas, the most public is the 30 full body casts of Gormley which are arranged on top of buildings throughout London, all facing the gallery.

Three of the Gormley Casts Can Be Seen on Nearby Buildings from the Gallery Terrace.

Sunday afternoon saw us shorten the interval between our monthly afternoon teas in order to share one with one of Sally's workmates who is soon to move to Shanghai. This week we visited Yauatcha, started and run by Alan Yau who also owns Hakkasan, which we visited just a couple of weeks ago. Yauatcha has an incredible interior and a very different afternoon tea, the oriental afternoon tea which includes dim sum rather than sandwiches. The combination of the beautiful interior and delicious food made it a great afternoon.

Yauatcha's Entrance.

Oriental Afternoon Tea at Yauatcha.

With our weekend coming to a close, we retired home to prepare for the week ahead, which includes an 80s Matchbox B-Line Disaster concert!

Updated map link:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=108781270355512035411.000001130555522820954&ie=UTF8&ll=51.511627,-0.142479&spn=0.080233,0.22831&t=h&z=13&om=1

Dùn Èideann....

This weekend saw Sally and I board a train for our first journey out of England. After a four hour train ride, we arrived right in the middle of Edinburgh at around 7.30pm. We quickly found our way to our accommodation, taking in as much of the ambiance of the city on the walk there as possible. Once checked in, we quickly found a local student pub, The Cragg, which sported an incredibly affordable and tasty menu.

Some of the buildings in our accommodation, with Arthur's Seat in the background.

On Saturday morning, we wandered into the heart of Edinburgh's old town, discovering the Royal Mile. At the top of the Royal Mile is Edinburgh Castle, a beautiful and preserved castle overlooking the city. Wandering the castle we saw many amazing things including the Scottish Crown Jewels (which were locked in a box for 111 years) and the spot where Mary Queen of Scots gave birth to James, later James the 1st. James became the first king of the three realms, England, Ireland and Scotland.

Edinburgh Castle, or part thereof.

A Huge Fireplace in the Castle.

After our extended visit to the castle, we again took to the Royal Mile, this time heading to the other end. With the Holyrood Palace facing the end of the Royal Mile, the lower end also is home to the recently built Scottish Houses of Parliament. Having been somewhat of a controversy due to its massively over budget and late construction, it is an incredibly brave design for a public building and of a huge scale. The design overall seemed to me to be over-complicated, but it was humbling to see such a bespoke building. Literally every detail in the building was meticulously tied in to the overall design. It really was no surprise at the excessive cost and construction time.

The Scottish Houses of Parliament.

An Example of the Building's Complexity.

Some More of the Incredible Details.

After the Scottish Houses of Parliament, we visited the National Galleries of Scotland. Passing the huge memorial to Sir Walter Scott, we found the galleries held some amzming works, Titians, Van Goghs, Blakes, Monets and more. Arriving with just an hour to explore before closing time, we made our way through the galleries and then made our way home.

Sunday morning we awoke with a mission, to conquer a mountain. With Arthur's Seat the major geological feature in Edinburgh and standing at 251m, we decided that this was to be our summit. We braved the track and did finally make it to the top, and it was most definitely worth it. The most spectacular view awaited us, as we could easily see 30km in every direction.

The View from Arthur's Seat Over Edinburgh.

Sally and I on Arthur's Seat.

After such a fitting Sunday morning constitutional, we began to make our way back into the heart of the city, to lunch at Valvona and Crolla. V&C is a genuine Italian delicatessen with a wonderful cafe at the rear. With such wonderful ingredients, we were treated with a tasty pasta lunch to set us right for the afternoon.

Following lunch we headed back to the Royal Mile for our tour of the Real Mary King's Close. In the original old town of Edinburgh there were many tenement buildings, all running along the Royal Mile, with tiny alleys running between them. These alleys were and still are known as closes. With the fancy houses facing onto the Royal Mile and increasingly squalid buildings running along the closes, they would have been horrid places to inhabit. Eventually a new Royal Exchange was to be built on the Mile. This necessitated that many of the tenements be demolished, but rather than demolish them, it was decided to build on top of them. Adding arches and some walls for structural integrity, the huge exchange literally built over the old town. Mary King's Close has since been rediscovered and opened for tours, exposing the well preserved buildings below.

Borthwick's Close.

Being hit with the only 10 minutes of rain experienced for the whole weekend, we quickly hopped on a bus to collect our luggage and head back to Waverly train station to return to London. Arriving back in London well into the night, we returned home with memories of our exciting and immensely pleasurable weekend.


So that's our weekend in Edinburgh, it was excellent to visit such an historic and vibrant city. I hope that everyone is well.


As usual, here's my map, updated with the furthest markers added so far!

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=108781270355512035411.000001130555522820954&ll=53.15948,-2.409745&spn=9.901989,29.223633&z=6&om=1