Samstag, 18. Oktober 2003
London: Day Fourteen
For this day, I exactly planned what I wanted to see. It was the last saturday I had available and I felt like I had to catch up with all things I had missed earlier.
So I had a look at the map and decided on the route. I left home at about 13:00 [after waking up at 12:00... ;-)] and went ot the bus station. My plan was to go to Liverpool Street by bus, and then take the tube to Picadilly Circus. But then I found out, that one bus was actually going to Picadilly at once. Of course I used this opportunity, because this way I would see more from the city.
After arriving at Picadilly Circus, on a wonderful sunny day once again, I went down Picadilly to see the huge hotels I already saw once at night. I really wanted to take some pictures of them, but as I walked down the place, they didn't look that impressive any more - really sad. I guess it's then a feature of seeing them at night. Still I took some pictures.
My next stop was the Hyde Park. This one was really huge, with broad walking paths and many trees, and it all looked so great in the sun and with some fallen leaves around. A great sight, with the lake in between the park. I also saw a lot of Squirrels, which I never got to see that close on an open area. All that made me walk really slow through the park, which took me like an hour.
I exited at the Bayswater Area, which I also wanted to see because of many hotels being there. But there was nothing special around that area, so I quickly went to Notting Hill Gate, which I wanted to visit because of the movie. I was told by Jose that there was this huge Portobello Market, with all kinds of goods and antiques and food which I had to see.
Even though I was afraid it could end up as frustrating as the Spitalfield market, I went through the whole thing. And of course it was even more frustrating than Spitalfield market. It was larger, there were more people, and even more items. The only thing which was good about more items was, that there were not only mostly women's clothing but also many other things. Basically, everything you could find on any flea market it Germany, like the one in the Rheinaue in Godesberg. So many, many useless items, which could mostly only be seen partially because of the enormous crowd.
So as I got pushed forward through that whole market, I soon felt myself lost in some Paddington-area. Of course the map I had with me didn't cover this area. I went straight to the next trainstation and bought me a Day-Ticket to hop between buses and trains. I even managed to get myself straight to Gloucester Road, which was my next target.
There I went to see the Natural History Museum, and the highlight of the day: The Lord of the Rings Exhibition. This was the only stop they made in Europe, as I was told by Claudia who wanted to see it initially. So I went by the Natural Musem, an impressive building. They were currently showing the Exhibition of "T-Rex: Did those teeth ever eat flesh?". This really caught my interest, as I already heard of it, but then I decided to not go in there and maybe lose time inside. Outside of the Museum there were many pictures of places around the world; monuments and people. This looked really great in the garden of the Museum, so I had to go there later that day.
Now I went inside the Science Museum. On the posters about the Exhibition it always said, one has to pre-order tickets to ensure availibility. I already thought I wouldn't get a ticket, but once enqueuing I got it without a problem. It was about 17:00h and my ticket was reading: "Entrance: 18:15". So I had some time to go to the Science Museum shop and looked at horrifying prices and decided to better go from Kensington Station to Gloucester Road again and have a diner at Burger King.
I thought that the exhibition would be a guided tour, so I went back to the Museum just in time, left my bag in the "special secured area", because no cameras or mobiles were allowed to be brought inside. After going to the first level, where the exhibition was held, I found out that there was no guided tour. And the area of the exhibition was really small. Geez, after spending about 20 Euro for that Exhibition I thought I would see something huge.
Nevertheless, I entered the area. On the first look, it wasn't that small after all, and there were *many* costumes and props standing around. The first things I looked at where some paintings/visualizations of the Tolkien-World, which were done with so much skill. All around were monitors playing videos repeatedly, and the first one told about how the World was visually created and they showed some people drawing sketches. I wish I could draw those things with only 1/100 of their skill, because they looked that impressive!
The props where mostly originals of the many thousands that were created for the Trilogy. Most of them look really real from a distance, but when you get close you can sadly easily see that they are made of plastic or whatsoever. I watched about every video there was inside the exhibition, but it was mostly stuff I had already seen earlier on TV or DVD.
I finished the exhibition in about 1 hour, because there wasn't that much to look at, and I couldn't look at the costumes for that long. This may have made a difference if I wouldn't have been alone there, but on your own it wasn't so mach fun at all. The London Dungeon was MUCH more fun, so this is my recommendation if you want to spend your money.
After I went outside, I called Jose to get the plan for that night, because we wanted to do something all together, as the mother of Greta was keeping the child this night. So I stayed around, looked at the picture exhibition I mentioned earlier (which was more fun than the LOTR-one, BTW!) and then went to SoHo.
I wanted to eat something in a restaurant or whatever, so I thought that would be the best place to go. But it surely wasn't, I couldn't find anything suited for me. Again, I ended up in the Subway.
As I waited for the others to come into town, I walked around Soho, counted some more Harmony's and went inside a large Bookstore and wanted to look for Vampire books. But of course I couldn't recall the names of the authors that Lars suggested to me on a blog entry.
Finally, Jose called me to tell me that they were just arriving at Aldgate. The mobile connection was really bad and I couldn hardly understand anything, so I just went straightly to Aldgate station by the Underground. But as I called Jose again, I got to know that I should have gone to 'Oldstreet', not 'Aldgate'. Geez. So back to the tube and to Oldstreet. But exactly that line was not served the day, so I had to go walking there. As I was always having a look at my map to see if I was going right, I got asked 3 times to lead some guys the way. That was really fun, I was feeling like a tourist guide.
In the end, I arrived at Old Street at about 23:00 and we went inside a local Club. I had two Vodka-Cranberry drinks, suggested by Jose. That really fit my taste. The club was really nice, though very loud - and mostly cool people all around you. Jose and I had a nice talk, and we left at about 1:00. Missing the night buses, we went half of the way back home by foot. But we made it to arrive at about 2:30. And that's it for the day.
After arriving at Picadilly Circus, on a wonderful sunny day once again, I went down Picadilly to see the huge hotels I already saw once at night. I really wanted to take some pictures of them, but as I walked down the place, they didn't look that impressive any more - really sad. I guess it's then a feature of seeing them at night. Still I took some pictures.
My next stop was the Hyde Park. This one was really huge, with broad walking paths and many trees, and it all looked so great in the sun and with some fallen leaves around. A great sight, with the lake in between the park. I also saw a lot of Squirrels, which I never got to see that close on an open area. All that made me walk really slow through the park, which took me like an hour.
I exited at the Bayswater Area, which I also wanted to see because of many hotels being there. But there was nothing special around that area, so I quickly went to Notting Hill Gate, which I wanted to visit because of the movie. I was told by Jose that there was this huge Portobello Market, with all kinds of goods and antiques and food which I had to see.
Even though I was afraid it could end up as frustrating as the Spitalfield market, I went through the whole thing. And of course it was even more frustrating than Spitalfield market. It was larger, there were more people, and even more items. The only thing which was good about more items was, that there were not only mostly women's clothing but also many other things. Basically, everything you could find on any flea market it Germany, like the one in the Rheinaue in Godesberg. So many, many useless items, which could mostly only be seen partially because of the enormous crowd.
So as I got pushed forward through that whole market, I soon felt myself lost in some Paddington-area. Of course the map I had with me didn't cover this area. I went straight to the next trainstation and bought me a Day-Ticket to hop between buses and trains. I even managed to get myself straight to Gloucester Road, which was my next target.
There I went to see the Natural History Museum, and the highlight of the day: The Lord of the Rings Exhibition. This was the only stop they made in Europe, as I was told by Claudia who wanted to see it initially. So I went by the Natural Musem, an impressive building. They were currently showing the Exhibition of "T-Rex: Did those teeth ever eat flesh?". This really caught my interest, as I already heard of it, but then I decided to not go in there and maybe lose time inside. Outside of the Museum there were many pictures of places around the world; monuments and people. This looked really great in the garden of the Museum, so I had to go there later that day.
Now I went inside the Science Museum. On the posters about the Exhibition it always said, one has to pre-order tickets to ensure availibility. I already thought I wouldn't get a ticket, but once enqueuing I got it without a problem. It was about 17:00h and my ticket was reading: "Entrance: 18:15". So I had some time to go to the Science Museum shop and looked at horrifying prices and decided to better go from Kensington Station to Gloucester Road again and have a diner at Burger King.
I thought that the exhibition would be a guided tour, so I went back to the Museum just in time, left my bag in the "special secured area", because no cameras or mobiles were allowed to be brought inside. After going to the first level, where the exhibition was held, I found out that there was no guided tour. And the area of the exhibition was really small. Geez, after spending about 20 Euro for that Exhibition I thought I would see something huge.
Nevertheless, I entered the area. On the first look, it wasn't that small after all, and there were *many* costumes and props standing around. The first things I looked at where some paintings/visualizations of the Tolkien-World, which were done with so much skill. All around were monitors playing videos repeatedly, and the first one told about how the World was visually created and they showed some people drawing sketches. I wish I could draw those things with only 1/100 of their skill, because they looked that impressive!
The props where mostly originals of the many thousands that were created for the Trilogy. Most of them look really real from a distance, but when you get close you can sadly easily see that they are made of plastic or whatsoever. I watched about every video there was inside the exhibition, but it was mostly stuff I had already seen earlier on TV or DVD.
I finished the exhibition in about 1 hour, because there wasn't that much to look at, and I couldn't look at the costumes for that long. This may have made a difference if I wouldn't have been alone there, but on your own it wasn't so mach fun at all. The London Dungeon was MUCH more fun, so this is my recommendation if you want to spend your money.
After I went outside, I called Jose to get the plan for that night, because we wanted to do something all together, as the mother of Greta was keeping the child this night. So I stayed around, looked at the picture exhibition I mentioned earlier (which was more fun than the LOTR-one, BTW!) and then went to SoHo.
I wanted to eat something in a restaurant or whatever, so I thought that would be the best place to go. But it surely wasn't, I couldn't find anything suited for me. Again, I ended up in the Subway.
As I waited for the others to come into town, I walked around Soho, counted some more Harmony's and went inside a large Bookstore and wanted to look for Vampire books. But of course I couldn't recall the names of the authors that Lars suggested to me on a blog entry.
Finally, Jose called me to tell me that they were just arriving at Aldgate. The mobile connection was really bad and I couldn hardly understand anything, so I just went straightly to Aldgate station by the Underground. But as I called Jose again, I got to know that I should have gone to 'Oldstreet', not 'Aldgate'. Geez. So back to the tube and to Oldstreet. But exactly that line was not served the day, so I had to go walking there. As I was always having a look at my map to see if I was going right, I got asked 3 times to lead some guys the way. That was really fun, I was feeling like a tourist guide.
In the end, I arrived at Old Street at about 23:00 and we went inside a local Club. I had two Vodka-Cranberry drinks, suggested by Jose. That really fit my taste. The club was really nice, though very loud - and mostly cool people all around you. Jose and I had a nice talk, and we left at about 1:00. Missing the night buses, we went half of the way back home by foot. But we made it to arrive at about 2:30. And that's it for the day.
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