Dowd adventures in Bologna: Home Sweet Home. London

domenica 26 febbraio 2012

Home Sweet Home. London

Well we are all back from a week in London, and what a week. catching up with Holly and Steve Thomson and baby Rose in Richmond, and then stayed with Kate and Mike Frayes family in Chelsea which was fantastic fun

For me it was a Picasso and English influenced artists at the Tate, then David Hockney "A Bigger Picture" at The Royal Academy of the Arts, and then Freud at the Portrait Gallery, finishing with new German artists at Satcchi Gallery. The Tate modern was terrific, but no major show on that l wanted to see. As well as that we had an exhibition of Scotts expedition to Antarctica in 1912 when he died at the Natural History Museum, and another photographic show of Ponting and Hurleys photographs from Shackelton and Scotts trips. So life was great for me for a week, and the boys enjoyed most of the shows, especially the natural history museums rock/ mineral display and a dinosaur exhibition. A few weeks earlier l was in New York for 5 days, and l must say that London has it on New York for art shows and exhibitions, London to me seems very alive and clever, were New York seemed tired and the same. Don't get me wrong, Central Park, the people, buildings of NY are amazing, and it is New York, but l guess I was surprised by London as l did not expect much. Now we have been in Bologna around 10 months, and it was quite lovely to have fish and chips, steak pies, pork pies with squashed peas to eat, but the coffee and brioches are just too good in Italy to compare, there was alot of Starbucks, which is really crappy. We loved the double decker buses, and you must get an Oyster card to travel with , big saving. The other great delight was so many green areas, my favorite is St James Park, the view and effect of light across the pond is picturesque, but any green area is good,especially from Bologna were there are none really except for Marguerita Gardens.

All our friends were so good to us, Mike kept going out of his way as always to make sure we enjoyed ourselves, and Kate was so relaxed and easy with us, though she had sick kids and no nanny that week. And of course Holly and Steve were Holly and Steve, perfect. It was also good to catch up with my old neighbour from Waterloo Street, Simon Lee who has been living there for 25 years, and has his own most impressive major gallery there, he kindly invited us to his place at late notice for drinks, and we hope to keep in touch alot more. So London was terrific, and l dont harbor the emotions l had of the English nearly as much as before.

We did the "EYE" the big wheel which apparently is London's biggest fund earner in tourism, and l must say it was terrific, we went up on a sunny day, so that helped. The thing we noticed was the queues, we lined up to go into the Natural History museum for 45 minutes, then another 20 minutes to get into the show, then it was 35 minutes at Hockney, 30 minutes at Freud to then get a entry ticket for an hour later, and the wheel was a bout 45 minutes. They say book your tickets on line, and in some cases that can be quicker, but often it is the queuing to get into the show that takes time. My best advice is get a pram and a doll, push up to the start of the line, and say you had to leave quickly from the show as the child had shitted itself, and l feel you will sneak in straight away and for free. Of course you will have to find a pram and doll. Everyone in London is incredibly friendly, from the hotel we stayed in near Richmond at Kew Gardens to the cabbie, underground ticket operator, bus operator, tour guides, it was hard to find someone who was rude or uncaring. Thank fully we made it back to Italy, where as Jayne remarked as soon as the plane landed everyone started pushing and being generally unhelpful, ahh its good to be back home!!!The first meal we had was dinner that night a solid tortellini broda, lasagna, gnocchi, and tagliatelle fungi, simple and perfect. Followed up with a gelati. Its amazing the difference in two places only 1 1/2 hours away from each other by plane, and thank god for that!