Liz had to work all day, so we hung around and were good parents; washing, supermarketing, getting meals, reading quietly and napping - a proper family Sunday.
Monday
Summer has arrived - forecast 23 today and much the same for the rest of the week - clouds and a little rain, perhaps, but 23 - 24 all week. Liz suggested we take advantage of the day to visit Kew Gardens, so off we went, south-west along the Thames to this gigantic botanic garden, of which we covered about 20% in 3 hours - and took a few nice piccies.
Back into South Kensington. Bev sat while Russell browsed the Energy Hall (Boulton/Watt and the steam engine, Parsons and the steam turbine, etc), then wandered along to a display of 3D printing and learnt quite a bit he didn't know.
This is a model radial-cylinder aircraft engine, about 60 cm diameter, and has a handle on the back. When you turn the handle, the crankshaft drives the pistons in and out and the prop-housing on the front turns, as you'd expect.
But it was 3D printed in one piece, and they had a movie showing it being done. Amazing.
Tuesday
One warm day, and the bare polled trees we've been passing on our walk to the station have burst into leaf.
V&A - wedding dresses
Liberty - some fine Liberty-print cotton shirts
Russ procrastinated about a Nike jacket
Wednesday
A wasted morning visiting the Keats House at Hampstead;. He lived there productively from 1818 - 20, and it's now a museum and library. We'd researched this before we came over, even drawn a map of how to get there from the station. But we didn't read our crib-sheet this morning, so when we walked out of Hampstead Underground station, 55 minutes after leaving Liz's, it wasn't the station we remembered, or the one we'd mapped. But Bev had read the item in the Eyewitness Guide last night, so she could figure out where to go. A pleasant long walk down the slope of Hampstead High Street followed, checking out the Georgian and Edwardian architecture, and figuring that this place must be as expensive as Notting Hill or Holland Park!
Got to Keats' House a bit before 11 - read the sign saying it doesn't open till 1 PM. Mmmmmmm? Let's go back into town and tick off the National Gallery.
So we walk further downhill 2 blocks to Hampstead Heath overground station, look at the Railways Map, and decide that we can't get there from here (too many changes).
So we have a long slow trudge up Hampstead High Street, and it's hot, because it's summer today!!!
Tube back to Charing Cross, into the now-familiar Crypt at St Martin in the Fields for some soup and crusty bread, (recommended) then into the Gallery. Revisit all the icons, get revitalised by Moroni, Botticelli, Vincent's chair and wheatfields (both painted at St Remy, where I stayed on my 2012 motorcycle jaunt), etc. Our brains refilled, it's shopping time, so up Oxford Street Nike jacket, then John Lewis - amazing stuff! A couple of nice jumpers and that's about all we have energy for. Luckily Bev remembered that we can catch the 23 bus in Oxford street, so we make use of a roving Information Officer (in his suit and bowler hat, they're everywhere) and just sit and let someone else drive us to within a hundred metres of Liz's door.
Thursday
Domestic chores consumed most of the day.
We had a leisurely walk around the area to the west of Liz's flat, passing by very many white-painted Georgian buildings as well as the walled garden featured in the film Notting Hill. Wandered further doe Portland Road to Avondale Park; lots of trees and shrubs and gardens, plus tennis coutts, play equipment and a cafe. Entirely unheralded, only three blocks from Portobello Road. It also boasts the worlds first grass-free lawn.
At 4.30 we headed off via tube to Sloane Square station and thence to the 50th Chelsea Flower Show, and spent a happy 2 hours wandering past some stunning massed flower displays and very many underwhelming wildflower-themed display gardens.
Exhausted, we decided to wait for the 352 bus and let it carry us all the way to Ladbroke Grove, 2 blocks from home. 20 minute wait, while seven 352 buses went past on the other side of the road. Then 40 happy minutes on the top deck of the big red bus; a low-energy finish to our London explorations.
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