Back to Flick & Dave's Web Site

Our pace in London was a little more measured.  We even managed a snooze at our good friend Lara's place on the Tuesday afternoon after arriving from New York, before heading to Waterloo for dinner with Tamara and Harinie.

Lara accompanied us on Wednesday on a day where a vague plan to visit the Tate Modern turned into a series of fortuitous occasions.  Example, exiting from Waterloo station we caught a glimpse of the London Eye ferris wheel (though the term hardly does justice to the 140m diameter structure which takes about half an hour to complete an orbit) and decided to give it a go.  Well worth it for great views over Westminster, the West End and City.

We wandered along the South Bank and tried out the Millennium pedestrian bridge to take lunch outside St Paul's Cathedral, then decided to detour to the replica Globe Theatre.  Where quite by chance a matinee of Much Ado About Nothing was just commencing, so we bought tickets to the pit (which were cheaper than going to the museum) and enjoyed a fun performance by an all female cast.

We did make it to the Tate Modern, before heading into the City to catch up with Harinie, Deanne and Andrew for dinner and drinks (above).

Thursday was shopping day, accompanied by Lara and Harinie and starting at the new Running Bare (Flick's work's brand) concept store in Putney.  From there it was on to Harinie's work: Sweaty Betty, followed by lunch and a wander up Kings Road and thence to Harvey Nick's.  Soho and the Berwick St fabric shop followed, where we teamed up with Tamara and later enjoyed high tea at Liberty's on Regent St.  We hadn't managed to actually buy anything until we reached Top Shop and H&M on Oxford Street.

After dinner (where we were joined by Deanne and Dan - below Left), we headed to the Soho Theatre to see Flight of the Conchords, surprising performer Bret who would've known we were coming if he'd checked his voice mails.  In true FotC style, Dave was quickly made the butt of a joke, much to the amusement of the audience, though Bret did apologise after the show over a drink with his partner Hannah (below right with Germaine, the other half of "New Zealand's fourth most popular comedy folk duo").  A thoroughly entertaining and side-splitting evening.

On Friday we said goodbye to Lara and made a brief visit to Aunt Penny to inspect her collection of antiquities before returning to the East End to see if any of Flick's clients from her rag trade run during our stay in 1996 were still there.  They were, and were very surprised and pleased to see her.

We just made it to Charing Cross in time for our train to Kent to see Rose & Ken in Little Romney (view of their flat from the beach below left), and enjoyed a fun evening with them, treated to the best Indian in town.  Saturday we had just enough time for a brief visit to the picturesque village of Rye (below right) before heading reluctantly back to Heathrow to commence the final leg of our journey.