Another Catch Up...and few pics too!

Hello all, yes, once again my inherent slackness reached its zenith, with another week passing and no blog entry to show for it. Well, with the two reasonably quiet weeks we've had, I'll just have to catch up now...

Firstly to last week. Tuesday night Sally and I ventured to the O2 (formerly the Millennium Dome) to see one of the world's great music icons, Prince. Prince has played the O2 21 times over the last month, selling out the 20,000 seat venue every night. If his numbers don't impress you, then his show certainly will. Not being the hugest Prince fan, I'm not intimately acquainted with much of his catalogue, nevertheless it was an incredible show, well worth making the effort to see. It was great to see a show which reinvented the most standard of concert efforts, the encore. Because the stage was in the middle of the arena, Prince had to come through the crowd to reach it, but rather than walk, he was wheeled in in a box...yes, a box. So when he left the stage after the first encore and the house lights came up, pretty much everyone assumed it was over. Sal and I sat and waited for the crowd to disperse, when all of a sudden there were screams as the box route was being cleared and then.... the box appeared again! No longer were the houselights assurance that the show is over! Playing the second encore solo at his keyboard, it was pretty incredible to see a musician start three or four beats, then slam his hand on the keyboard declaring "I've got too many hits!" and not be exaggerating! No photos unfortunately, they searched everyone's bag and ALL cameras were checked in. Even the woman with a disposable camera that had no film left had to check the useless aperture in.

That weekend saw us begin our house hunting for real, visiting a few different agents and a couple of reasonably disappointing properties, with lots of "We don't really have anything, all the students coming back are taking everything as soon as it become available" meaning we ended the search in fairly ordinary spirits. The only positive side of the search came in the form of the comforting meeting we had with one of the big agencies over here, but then we had to wait until Tuesday night for the viewings... Following this blow to our confidence, we spent the rest of the weekend moping around the house, lots of kicking the dirt with our toes, hands in pockets and shoulders shrugged.

Finally our one shining hope arrived, our Tuesday night appointment with Chloe, having sent through a few choices from the website, we were unfortunately told when we arrived that two of the four we were meant to be visiting were either taken or not available to be viewed. Worrying that our hopes were in vain, we arrived at the first property to look around and have to comment "This is exactly what we're looking for". With the tenant away for a few days though, we were told that something like 20 people had seen the property that day, with numerous offers already made. With the asking price at the top of our budget, it seemed unlikely that we could match hordes of cashed up prospective tenants.

We had two golden rules for our place, must be furnished and must be available before we head back to Aus in October. This is pertinent to mention, as the only other property to view isn't available until almost the end of our trip back to Aus. Wondering if it was worth the effort, we made our way to the next property. It was worth the effort, yet another "exactly what we're looking for" apartment, but set directly across the road from a beautiful church in a park, and just minutes walk from Upper St, a London equivalent of King William Rd.

Our Apartment.

The Kitchen in our Apartment.

The rest of the week was spent preparing references, handing over an obscene amount of money as a deposit, signing contracts and the like. Just a couple of days later, we were informed that we had in fact, secured the property! Finally it was all sorted. Well, sort of. Remember our golden rules? Well, it turns out we broke both of them, and so now the worry of furnishing the property, considering we'll be arriving from Australia to pick the keys up and move in, is now of concern.


This weekend we took the opportunity of having settled the accommodation problem by having a wonderful breakfast at Ottolenghi, an incredible patisserie on Upper St, before wandering around what is soon to become our neighbourhood. The rest of the weekend was again spent kicking around the house, readying ourselves for yet another week at work...


With mum only a week away now, we're getting ready for a big month as we show her around London for a fortnight before hopping on planes ourselves and heading back to Australia for another fortnight before things finally settle down and we arrive to our new house.


So there you have it, that's the update for this week and last. Hopefully I'll be able to maintain my discipline and ensure my blog is up to date!


Map's up top.

Pizzas, Pads, Proms

With another working week behind us, we headed home on Friday with a quiet night on our minds. We were, however, beckoned to dinner, pizza with Jane and Justin in Angel. Angel was busy, with the high street cafes, pubs and clubs all bursting at the seams. Following our tasty dinner, we wandered the short walk to the Charles Lamb for a drink. With the Lamb closing at 11, we called it an early night and hopped on the tube home.




With our curent accomodation expiring in mid October, we are beginning our house hunting. As such we spent Saturday scoping out areas and making contact with some of the local real estate agents. Although it appears that the returning students have taken all the properties available at the moment, it was good to visit Camden and Mornington Crescent, the areas which are currently at the top of our list.

Saturday evening contained our major event for the weekend, Proms in the Park. In conjunction with the Last Night of the Proms, concerts are held in five parks around the UK. We along with 400,000 other people descended upon Hyde Park to hear Terry Wogan host an amazing concert which opened with the BBC Concert Orchestra playing the theme from Star Wars, followed with the theme from Doctor Who. Both of which are quite incredible when played by a full orchestra! Throughout the night various opera singers sung, a clarinet soloist soloed, and a Pop Idol winner popped. Soon however it was time to cross to the Royal Albert Hall to witness the classics Pomp & Circumstance, Land of Hope and Glory and the Sea Fantasia including Rule Britannia! Of course, it was all topped off with Jerusalem, a rousing rendition of God Save the Queen and some fireworks.

Terry Wogan in Full Flight.

God Save the Queen.

Kablam!

Sunday we met up with a distant relative of Sal's who had just recently arrived in London before heading to Nottingham University for a semester. We met and had multiple coffees at one of Antonio Carluccio's many cafes, and of course spent hours trading travelling stories. Sunday afternoon was spent relaxing in front of the rugby, before a local pub meal for dinner and preparations for the coming work week.


So that's it for this week, link to my map is at the top!

The Three Bs; Belgium, Brussels and Beer.

This weekend saw us finally make it to the continent. Our trip to Belgium had finally arrived, so Friday night we headed to Waterloo station after work for our 6 o'clock Eurostar to Brussels. After 2 and a half short hours, we arrived at Gare Midi, right in the centre of Brussels. We quickly managed to find a cab to whisk us through the streets to our hotel, the Warwick Barsey. Once checked in to the hotel, the working week caught up with us, so we familiarised ourselves with the room and went bed.

Saturday morning we arose and headed downstairs for the included breakfast, a wonderful buffet affair, allowing us to fill up for the busy day ahead. We started by wandering the three or so kilometres into town along Avenue Louise, past the Palais de Justice, the gallery district and an antiques market to 'Koningsplein'. The Royal Art Museum sits on Koningsplein, surrounded by the palaces, now filled with public facilites and hotels. The Royal Art Museum houses a wonderful collection, tranversing ancient art of Hieronymous Bosch from the 15th century all the way through to the modern art of Donald Judd and Pannamarenko.

Palace Turned Art Museum.

After spending a couple of hours wandering through the halls of the Royal Art Museum, we made our way to the Grand Place, the original market square of Brussels, for the National Belgium Beer Weekend. Some thirty stalls selling some 170 beers was brilliant. Unlike most festival type events elsewhere in the world, the prices were very reasonable! It was a great chance to try a wide variety of Belgian beers that I had never heard of! We took a quick break from the beers to visit the nearby beer museum, which consisted entirely of a video in french, and were disappointed, so we headed straight back to the tents for a final beer.

The Belgium Beer Weekend in Full Swing.

Happy Simon.

First Beers of the Day....Close Up.

Second Beers of the Day.

Sally with a Cherry Beer!

Third Beers for the Day.

Fourth and Final Beer for the Day.

Having finished our first day at the beer tents, we walked across town to the Belgium Comic Museum. Containing a broad range of information about how comics are made and the range of comics made in Belgium, it had an obvious focus on the greats Herge and Peyo. To end our Saturday we made our way to a bar called Archiduc, which apparently had an incredible interior and was a must to stop and have a drink. Unfortunately when we arrived, it wasn't open! So we settled for catching the tram back to our hotel for a brief rest before heading to a nearby cafe for dinner.

The Belgian Comic Museum.

Sunday morning we arose slightly later before hopping on a tram to head directly across town to visit the Atomium. The Atomium was built for the 1958 World Expo and is based on the structure of a unit cell of an iron crystal. It is a massive and striking building, but is basically just silly. I find it amazing that it was built, and that is has survived until now, but unless they store wigs in it, it just seems a little pointless.

The Atomium Peeking Through the Trees.

The Atomium Up Close.

The Atomium in All its Shiny Glory.

We broke our tram ride back into town by stopping at the Magritte Museum. The house that Rene Magritte and his wife Georgette lived in for 24 years before Magritte's work gained him fame and fortune has been restored and maintained and is now a museum. Holding a maximum of 20 people, this tiny museum is one of my favourite experiences due to the personal attention of the tour guide and the intimacy you feel seeing the home as it was when Magritte painted some of his great works. We wandered back to the tram to continue our journey to the city centre. We quickly headed back to the Grand Place to use up the last of our beer tokens, and to make some merchandise purchases. I managed to get a De Konnick t-shirt for a mere 4.50 euro!

Rene Magritte's House

My Final Beer Weekend Beer.

With the afternoon moving on and our evening train looming, we headed to the Horta Museum. Victor Horta is Belgium's most famous architect, and his house has also been turned into a museum. The amazing art nouveau styling that runs throughout the house covers every detail, from the balustrades through to the door handles. It was great to see an architect's house designed at the height of his career. Having finished our tour, we returned to the Warwick Barsey to collect our bag and then headed towards the train station, stopping for dinner along the way. We boarded the train and yet another short ride later, we arrived safe and sound at Waterloo.

Victor Horta's Front Door.

So that just about wraps up our weekend in Belgium, this week we face another 5 days of work before a thankfully quiet weekend.

Hope everyone's well, and here's the link to my map, with it's first continental place markers!
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=108781270355512035411.000001130555522820954&ll=53.553363,0.681152&spn=9.82604,29.223633&z=6&om=1