A sweltering time in old London Town.

Hello Everybody

Well, we're here in London for a couple of days to attend a concert.
I'm cheating a bit with this blog entry - we arrived in London on Monday afternoon and now its Wednesday afternoon and we're on our way home! However, its been a very busy few days so I'll get you up to speed with what we've been doing.

Monday
We drove down to London - quite a boring journey really, motorway for most of the trip with a little bit of major ring road action towards the end. We were staying at the old Hilton in Wembley as we were in London to see Spinal Tap in concert at Wembley Arena. Found the hotel ok - we had been given a "Plaza" room which was on the 9th floor and came complete with freebies - wine, fruit, bottled water, chocolates, etc. - very nice.
Have I mentioned it was quite a boring drive - well, it was. But during our boring journey we had discussed the possibility of us getting to Wimbledon to see some of the tennis. We aren't huge tennis fans - it would be just for the experience really - so, once we'd freshened up a bit we set off in 30+ degree temperatures to find the tube and headed for SW19. We got to the Wimbledon station after a couple of tube changes and walked along with the masses to join the queue for tickets. We queued for almost 2 hours (we had to join a queue to get into another queue - its a good job we're British!) but we eventually made it in to the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club - known as Wimbledon to the rest of the world. What a great venue! We had to scramble up a small hill to see anything at all but we eventually got a decent view of the big screen showing Andy Murray's game on Centre Court. The tickets for Centre Court would have been around £90 (face value) even if there had been any available (which there weren't) but we had bought general admission tickets which would let you on any of the 19 courts except the main Centre Court and Courts 1 and 2.
We watched the game for a while, had strawberries and cream (and pizza!) and headed back for the tube home before the hoardes came out. I've attached a couple of pics - we were tired, hot and sweaty but we had a great time and it's another experience we can tick off our list.

Tuesday
We had planned to take the guided tour around Wembley Stadium today but Take That scuppered our plans! The stadium was literally at the end of our road and we headed there after breakfast. However, the tours had been suspended due to preparations for a series of Take That concerts. We had to make do with some photos of us outside the stadium (attached) and then headed back to the tube for some stereotypical touristy sightseeing in London. We visited Trafalgar Square, the Embankment (by the river) and just mooched about trying to find bits of shade and air conditioned comfort. The TV reported temperatures around 32 degrees in the city centre - we can confirm this!
Once back at the hotel we took advantage of their very nice pool and spa facilities - a lovely way to cool off. We had an afternoon nap (well...we're getting on a bit you know!) and then headed out for some food and then to the concert.
Wembley Arena is a great venue - not as big as some but there was a great atmosphere in the building. Spinal Tap were great! They did a full set of their best known stuff complete with dancing druid dwarves and an inflatable Stonehenge - and the drummer managed to stay intact throughout! (if you're not sure what I'm talking about then you need to watch the film "This is Spinal Tap"!) The concert goers were in party mode after the concert and the venue has a great plaza in front with fountains, lights and speakers. Lots of us hung around for something to eat and to watch the exhibitionists amongst us dance in the fountains. Most kept some of their clothes on but you always get some extremes in any crowd....!

Wednesday
A lazy morning - breakfast was served until 10am so we took advantage of this and stuffed ourselves on full English breakfast (and a good selection of the Continental breakfast too!). We were out of the hotel and round the North Circular to join the M1 northbound by 11.30am and we're now halfway home.

I hope you've enjoyed this potted version of our adventures in London.
Our next trip is to Skye at the end of July...hope you're still reading us then!

Take care

D&M
xx