A day in the life of the Big Smoke...

A wee mini adventure in-between house clearing chores took us to London town to enjoy and rather stunning space spectacular concert at the Royal Albert Hall this last weekend. This was my first visit to this venue and we had a brilliant night out. Dr Fred and I were guests of two very dear pals who treated us to a private box, we made a serious effort - you know brushing hair and proper clobber and all looking the bees knees we had a very enjoyable evening - fab meal at a nearby Lebanese restaurant and then superb music from various composers (including John Williams) performed by the London Concert Orchestra with Raymond Gubbay, accompanied by a laser light show and indoor fireworks. ET turned up as did Superman and Darth Vader - the music was amazing - varied and it surprised me how much of it I instantly recognized from the various film sound tracks - many movies that I have grown up with over the years...

The next day we got up and organised and went to the Tower of London - another place I had not visited before. we have always felt that if we did ever get in power as a group of dissidents we would rounding up a lot of people and sending them to the Tower so it would be a good idea to scope it out!!!

It was heaving with tourists!!! So we joined the various queues and had a really informative day out... we wandered around with one of the Beefeater tours - very entertaining and full of the gory details so often associated with the Tower (less than I'd imagined) - the Crown Jewels were very sparkly and seemingly lacking much security but we decided not to test this theory - bloomin thick doors on each end of display room but we had expected more visible armed protection - after all the single diamond in the sceptre is worth a mere 400 million squids!!!

The ravens were evident but really not happy to pose for photographs - I expect it gets a bit wearing being so responsible - legend has it if they leave the tower it will fall and the country will be ruined - they are well cared for ... meanwhile their wings are clipped, but they are on rations ... probably get fed better then some families....

The Tower is a institution, run on routines and rituals. Its not quite as fanciful as Gormanghast but similarities emerge... traditions are upheld and played out daily, there is even a room with bright carvings - the wooden horses date back to the 17th century (some earlier) and they are quite exquisite and beautiful.

It was a long day - so much to see - we got museum leg after about 4 hours, just couldn't take any more in so we headed of to a very fancy patisserie to eat lovely french cakes and coffee before returning to the car to head back into everyday life...

Scotland part 2

The second half of the week continued in much the same vein. We had one rainy afternoon which was actually quite nice to be holed up in the house with the rain lashing the windows. It probably wasn't quite so nice for the two visitors that came on their bikes but they're tough cookies - and its only water- but I did feel sorry for them having to cycle six miles back down the track in the wind and rain, but given Scotland, it wasn't as bad as it could be. The big quest for the 2nd half of the week was to find some deer antiers! The chap that owned the house dropped in to visit - he was a very friendly fella and was chatting about how this was the time of year when all the Stags lost their antlers (he collected them and sold them) so after that we were on the serious lookout. It's always been Fred's mission to find some dropped antlers.... The Monro baggers continued with the mission to bag the remaining three Monros... there is discussion as whet...

Vigo

We left the ship to explore Vigo. Its a much larger place then we expected... although tbh I hadn't given ut a lot of thought. Its a real mish mash of old and new and having got a map from tourist info we decided to follow the walking trail to the Monte Castro... the highest point of the town. Most of the town was pretty much as everywhere else... lots of traffic... lots of people... one or two interesting buildings and a lot of shopping. We headed to the art gallery - this has been a year of gallery visits so we we seen o reason to change now. The Museo de Marco is housed in the towns ex prison building and its very grand. In fact, I think that on this occaision the building might have been more interesting than the art.... Although the visiting exhibition by Susanne S D Themlitz was strangely compelling. It was a huge varied collection of eclectic items... found, salavaged, manipulated and arranged in lots of ways - weirdly inspiring - and mostly enjoyable to look at...

Funchal

So after three days at sea we finally hit Funchal in Madeira. An escape from the ship, and I have to say it was very pleasant indeed. First of all the weather is really splendid. Especially when you know that everybody else in the UK is suffering grim storms and vile winds.. Over here it is between 22 and 25 degrees is really quite warm. Funchal is a pretty city. It's built on a hill it with lots of lovely white houses with stunning red roofs. In order to get the best of it we walked along the sea front until we got to the cable car and we took it up the hill. It was a really good ride much longer than we imagined and it's quite weird because it goes right through the town - completely over everybody's house... So not only do you get a lovely vista of the bay but you can view the beautiful rooftops and get to look in everybody's gardens and to look at their picnic sets.. clean washing nice plants... scratty b...

Planet Ruby Starrs

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