London, A Fine Old Chap!

Until last weekend, I had officially been to London three times, and surprisingly I had never really seen the city. With most of my days there filled with work and the pub, there was hardly time to see Big Ben (viewed only from the distance) let alone any of the other sites London has to offer (I would name a few, but again, my visits have been so focused that I didn't even know what sites London has to offer). So when Martin suggested a trip up there to show me "his London", did Imention that my German boyfriend used to live in London, I thought it was a fantastic idea. We found a cheap flight, I booked a hotel using Marriot reward points, and before I knew it we were walking out of the tube and into the city.

From the quiet calm of Zurich to the craziness of London, Martin and I took the ultimate tour of the great city: beginning with a full English breakfast, followed by the champagne "flight" on the London Eye, and a walk past Big Ben, Parliament and Westminster Abbey ( I drew the line at paying GBP12 to see the inside, although I did stand outside and got teary eyed thinking about the famous wedding, my Princess Di doll and childhood dreams of becoming a princess, but settling for accounting). Lacking the royal escort, Martin and I hopped on the bus for a quick trip up to his old neighborhood of Hampstead, and after a quick stroll through the gardens we settled down for a beer and Pimms in Martin's favorite beer garden, The Freemasons Arm. Feeling refreshed from the beer and sub, we spent the afternoon wandering through the eclectic Camden Market, stopping in at every pub to use the toilet and grab another beer (my favorite being the one filled with a group of rowdy guys, guys with pink mohawks, a 70 year old man sitting at the bar and one girl, who might have been a hooker…Talk about a sharp contrast to the suits and blonds in a typical Zurich bar). The afternoon was perfectly complimented when, fully charged with Guinness, Martin and I found a great vintage store, where I proceeded to buy three of the most ridiculous vintage dresses I have ever seen and Martin purchased a classic 70s style pink button down shirt, complete with pink and purple flowers.

With our purchases in hand, and slightly buzzed from all of the excitement of the day, we decided to head directly to dinner at Crazy Hommies, the Mexican restaurant Martin had promised me for the past three weeks. We hopped back on to the tube for the quick 15 minute ride, ready for some chips and salsa. Unfortunately for us, the tube line we needed was closed, turning the 15 minutes into a 1.5 hour quest, involving buses, getting lost, more buses, walking, and finally flagging down a taxi. We arrived at Crazy Hommies slightly annoyed and completely starving (we hadn’t eaten since breakfast) only to find a 2 hour wait ahead of us. With my stomach empty, Crazy Hommies quickly turned into Crazy Lisa…I had a slight meltdown. Thankfully Martin handled the situation perfectly and we were able to save the evening.

With the slight misstep of Saturday night, the weekend still remained in tact with breakfast and shopping on Covent Gardens on Sunday and one final Guinness before our flight home.