After a pretty solid weekend we spent the start of the week working and resting. We were particularly tired on Monday evening! Another benefit of living in a dodgy hotel is that the lazy managers pull dodgy stunts some days. Thursday for instance, they decided to close the kitchen, due to guests leaving dirty dishes the night before. Ironically some of the mess left was actually the managers empty cider cans! So you can imagine how impressed Christine was when she gets home from school, with some steaks and vegetables for dinner, to find out that we would be unable to cook them! Everyone in the place was forced to head to the local takeaway joints for the evening. Apparently its too hard for management to identify who left the dishes, so everyone had to be punished!
We were very glad when Friday evening rolled around. We were meeting up with Jacinta, one of the girls we met in Pamplona, who was away the previous weekend. Not knowing exactly what the plan was, so we met in Knightsbridge. We found a cool little English pub called the Nags Head. It was tiny, heaps of decoration around the walls, old photos, newspaper articles, model aero planes and pilot hats. It was great to catch up with Jaz and hope to see her again. We had a few pints and a yarn about her travels and our travels. We then headed up the street to another pub for a feed.
Saturday afternoon Christine wasn’t feeling great, so Damien headed to Piccadilly to visit the White Cube gallery and the Royal Academy of Arts. This wasn’t as easy as it sounds. The bus stopped halfway, cancelled service. Walking from Marble Arch, it was a fight to get down the streets, as the bloody unions were ‘protesting’ (rioting). The riot was in full swing when I got to the Royal Academy, flares, sticks and bottles being thrown at buildings and police. I managed to get into the gallery which had quite heave security. Amongst the chaos, I somehow entered the gallery and enjoyed the Modern British Sculpture Exhibition, not realizing I was supposed to pay an admission fee. I then headed back out and around the riot, to the White Cube, which was cool but small only taking about 10minutes to look at.
I wandered through the city for a bit, had a stout in a nice little pub and then headed home for another party, Casey’s farewell. Casey loves the Church, the bar we went to last Sunday. So for her farewell it was a church theme with a lot of people heading to The Church on Sunday morning. Christine impressed making herself an outfit out of Strongbow Cider cartons.
Sunday was a quiet one. Just a bit of a sleep in, we watched the Melbourne F1 Grand Prix and then spent the afternoon with Chris and Kirst, having drinks in Hyde Park. Today is the first day of daylight savings! Sunday evening we finally got to eat our dinner from Thursday, Steak night Yum!
Friday night Sarah and Mel were having a double birthday celebration. As always, there had to be a theme, and this week’s theme was Disney. Maybe because it has been a little while since there has been a big party, but everyone got into it and had a good night. Christine borrowed a Maid Marion, Roman Emperor and King outfit from school which made it easy for us. Mel dressed as the Queen of Hearts, Sarah was snow white, there were a few Dalmatians, pirates, Alice in Wonderland and even a Princess Fiona! A few of the girls who have recently moved out came back so it was great to see them as well as a few old residents. Another late night at DC! 
After a big Bacon and Egg feed and then a few more hours in bed, we were ready to head out into the real world on Saturday. Not that we are counting down (56 days until we leave the UK!), but there are still a few, not many, but a few things we still want to do in London before we leave. One of these was to visit Abbey Rd, the location of the recording studio used by the Beatles as well as the pedestrian crossing that they used on their album cover. So with Mel we headed out for a walk, along the canals, through little Venice, past Lords and up to Abbey Rd, not too far from where we live. It was pretty amusing actually, being a Saturday afternoon, there were a few other tourists there as well as guys selling bootleg Beatles t-shirts. We sat and enjoyed the spectacle for a bit, the same tourists walking back and forth across the crossing, holding up frustrated drivers on what is actually quite a busy road! Then of course we had to have a go, waiting for the cars to clear before parading over the crossing, kinda fun! Not unlike some other tourist attractions, Christine got quite frustrated with the other tourists, or maybe it was her hangover induced short fuse? We had intended to keep walking through Regents Park, which we haven’t visited since Mum and Dad were here, but it was getting a bit cold, and everyone was tired so we just wandered back home, one more thing ‘ticked’ off our list. Saturday night we visited Gemma, Pinks + Hollie friends who have recently moved out of DC, in rather controversial circumstances! We were joined by Brad and Alex, a couple of guys that we still live with. It was a quiet night, that turned into a really good night. The girls are now living in an apartment not to far from us. It is a lot nicer, and cleaner than DC. They were asked to leave after playing a practical joke amongst themselves, a bit of an overreaction by the owner and management. But it turned out for the best, they now have a nice apartment in the area. The night was low key, drinks take away and a real good time. Sunday after a well deserved sleep in and a feed of pancakes we headed off to the Victorian and Albert Museum. This is not too far from home, a stroll through Hyde Park. Christine had been there for a day during school holidays with a housemate and was keen to show me around. Christine’s favourite part is the Cast Room. It has full size replica’s of sites from around the world. There are also lots of art works and sculptures in the gallery, most of which have been stolen from around the world by the British.
After this we headed through Hyde Park towards Chelsea. This is a very fancy area of London so the shops were all designer as were the cars. We popped into the Saatchi Gallery, which is full of contemporary art. The best piece was a work by Richard Wilson called 20:50. It is a site specific ‘Oil Installation’ which basically fills an entire room with sump oil. You enter the room and notice a really strong smell of oil but it actually looks like there is a dark perspecs floor which mirrors the ceiling. On closer inspection you notice that it is actually ripping under the ventilation. We also liked an installation by the artist Tessa Farmer which is contained within a perspecs box filled with dead insects. They are suspended by fishing wire and when you look very closely you notice tiny little figures actually riding the insects. Very freaky. After the gallery we headed to the hotel where Mel was working to say hi and have a coffee. It was then getting late so we called it a day and headed home.
