London, May 2-9, 2018

When we found out that Ryanair has direct flights from Grenoble to London (Stansted) that take a bit more than an hour, for as low as 9.99 euros per person, we did not think for long. Our one-week Spring trip was booked.

It was a bit more difficult to find an Airbnb apartment, and we ended up booking one in Wembley area, which was a mistake. It was a long and boring train ride away from everything. Besides there was not much around, but the Wembley Stadium neighborhood was a huge construction site --- in a couple of years it may be really nice. What we should have chosen is the Hackney and Dalston area that we checked first (and visited on our trip), but decided it is too far --- instead, Wembley as a name, was more familiar to us. Also our studio apartment, and the common kitchen shared by several studios, was a major disappointment; super dirty, badly equipped, plus we did not have a Wifi for the whole week, even if we asked the host several times.

Approaching Liverpool Street Station.

The first thing we did before heading out for dinner was to buy some breakfast items and stuff for cleaning at the nearby mart. Like said, there was nothing much around. Chinese and Indian places did not look attractive, Watkin's Folly's (a pub run by an Irish) kitchen was already closed, so we chose Ecco'la Cafe and Pizzeria.

We ordered two 10" pizzas and a Greek salad, and couldn't stop wondering why everyone wanted to speak English to us.

Next morning we spent quite a bit of time cleaning our studio and the common kitchen. Still the toaster made the fire alarm go off. Also one of the bath towels smelled so filthy we had to do laundry first. But before that we had to clean the washing machine ...

After the cleaning spree we finally headed out to explore the city.

We decided to start with our immediate neighborhood. We checked the Wembley Park Outlet Mall and made a tour around the stadium. Because of its sheer size and the number of cranes around, it was a hard subject to photograph.

Wembley Stadium.

From the stadium we took a train to Green Park station.

The Royal Academy of Arts - the Annenberg Courtyard, Burlington House, Piccadilly.

In the flock of tourists we walked to Piccadilly Circus, and from there to St. James's Park.

In the park some people were having lunch on the lawn, and those who had decided to spend their lunch hour jogging tried to swerve around tourists and birds.

Given the number of people in the park, we are surprised how many photos we managed to take without any.

We tried to get away from Buckingham Palace vicinity as fast as we could.

A souvenir shop.

Finally it was the time to find a place for lunch, and we chose La Strada, "an Italian Bistro" in Mayfair/Soho district. Actually they chose us, but we were too hungry to disagree, which we regretted immediately.

We had probably the worst baked potatoes (Jacket potatoes) ever -- they were utterly flavorless.

Then we took a metro (tube) to Waterloo Station, and visited a hole-in-the -wall pub for beers, since La Strada only had Carlsberg (or was it Heineken?) on tap.

We continued the South bank of the River Thames towards the London Bridge, stopping at the Anchor pub for a toilet and beer break.

The goal was to walk all the way to the Tower Bridge but we felt it was too far, and took the shortest route to the Liverpool Street station and the train back to Wembley.

This is a good opportunity to mention that during those seven days we spent in London (and Oxford) we had nothing but sunshine. There may have been some isolated clouds on some days, but mostly just deep blue skies with very warm daytime temperatures, and definitely no rain! (Now that we check the photos, there were not that many clouds). We consider us extremely lucky.

Happy hour --- after-office-hour drinks.

When back in Wembley we stopped by at Lidl supermarket and bought BBQ pork ribs, microwave potatoes, and lettuce for dinner. The ribs were so good that we bought them again on our last night. Potatoes were good too. We can find nothing like that in our local Lidl here in Grenoble.

We like to visit various significant sport venues in our travels. We have been to the Olympic Park in Beijing before, and now we visited Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London, which we did not find equally impressive.

The biggest problem was that there was not much going on, and the stadium itself was closed, probably because it is in active use by West Ham United. There were no food outlets either, whereas in Beijing there was a big food court/market.

Of course Beijing, as the capital, and its Olympic Park are hugely popular destinations for domestic tourism in China, unlike London that attracts mostly international tourists --- at least when we visited these places.

The only true attraction was ArcelorMittal Orbit, a sculpture and observation tower designed by Sir Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond.

Downtown London.

An upside down mirror.

The London Aquatic Centre.

Tomi paid extra 5 pounds to take the 178-meter tube slide down, but did not find it much fun in the occasionally dark tube where he could not predict the turns.

In turn, this kind of water fountains are always fun for kids all around the world.

After getting bored at the Olympic Park we returned to the Westfield Stratford City (mall) in hunt for a lunch spot. We walked back and forth a number of times checking the restaurant menus and eventually chose the restaurant Cabana, supposed to be Brazilian. What we had was a bit junk food but so much better than the "Italian" the day before.

From Stratford we took a double-decker No. 388 to the Elephant & Castle. Ticket controller entered the bus and found problems with our tickets (which we had validated upon entering the bus). He claimed it was because of software problems in his scanner. The jolly fellow collected some basic information from us, and left with reassuring "No worries!" When in E&C we walked around a bit and in no time found us at Hop Art Tap Room and Bottle Shop.

This artsy neighborhood was constructed from shipping containers.

A little farther away we stumbled upon another hidden gem, Mercato Metropolitano, a market of bars, micro breweries, and food stalls featuring world kitchens. The market had both indoor and outdoor seating areas.

Tanks of German Kraft.

Food at German Kraft.

Beer at German Kraft.

Unlike in Japan, these sample portions were made of real food.

Indoor food court and seating area. For an early Friday evening it was still quite quiet.

The brewery The Italian Job.

Ethiopian meat and injera platter for an early dinner --- we weren't really hungry but the food looked so good.

An ad in the train.

Our plan for Saturday was to visit the university town Oxford some 100 kilometers away. When at the Paddington station we found out that that weekend trains to Oxford did not leave from there, but from Marylebone station. The train was completely full.

Once in Oxford we soon found ourselves at a food market.

We enjoyed Sri Lankan chili chicken with noodles, and as a curry with rice and potatoes.

The town was full of tourists, and parents and other family members, since it was the graduation weekend.

We escaped the crowds in the botanical garden.

Conservatory.

We think this was the contemporary medical plant collection.

Rock garden.

Palm house.

From the botanical gardens we continued to the Christ Church Meadow.

We continued to downtown past several University of Oxford souvenir shops, each of them claiming to be the official or the original one.

We stopped by at The Eagle & Child pub, famous for its back room called a Rabbit room where in 30's the writer's club Inklings (with members like C.S. Lewis and J.R.R Tolkien) used to meet during lunch time,

for pints of English ales.

We continued our walk in the hot Saturday afternoon in a charming and quiet Jericho neighborhood.

We made a couple of pub stops on our way. First at Jericho Tavern.

And the second at Old Bookbinders Ale House.

And then we had to run to catch the train back to London.

Wembley North Station neighborhood looks like it could be from Asia.

This was our fourth day. Yesterday we had spotted a place called Little Venice near the Warwick Avenue station. That was our destination for Sunday.

However, we did not know that there was a Canalway Cavalcade, an annual May bank holiday weekend festival, happening. More than 100 canal boats gathered to the event which have taken place every year since 1983.

And there was also food available :)

Black Pearl, but Jack Sparrow was nowhere to be seen.

Communal bicycle tool set.

From Little Venice we headed towards Kensington Gardens.

On our way we had coffee at Stella's cafe.

Farther away from Kensington Palace we managed to enjoy our stroll in the gardens without excess presence of tourists.

Round Pond.

We could actually listen Queen Victoria speak, and she was quite comprehensible, which made us doubt if the accent was quite right.

Kensington Palace Garden.

Albert Memorial.

Diane Princess of Wales Memorial.

The bronze sculpture Serenity was designed by British sculptor Simon Gudgeon and was installed in the park by The Serpentine lake in 2009.

We continued our promenade towards the river, and briefly visited Harrods, very briefly.

Quietways are continuous and convenient cycle routes on less busy back streets across London. The Q15 goes from Belgravia to Earl Courts.

Our next destination was the former Battersea Power Station, which was in the process of turning into a new mixed use neighborhood combining residential, commercial, gastronomical, and cultural spaces for tourists and locals alike.

It was still very much work in progress.

Then it was about the time to find a way to get out of there, and back to Wembley.

When searching for a train station we found The Masons Arms, and stopped there to consider our options to get back to Wembley by a couple of beers.

We had grown very hungry so we also ordered avocado & wild garlic pine nut pesto bruschetta with roasted tomato salsa, and London Porter smoked salmon ciabatta.

We don't remember what we had for dinner that night, but this was our neighbor's pizza dinner.

This Monday we headed to Greenwich.

We skipped Cutty Sark and strolled around the university campus for a while waiting for the lunch time.

Queen's house.

Royal Observatory of Greenwich.

Queen's House.

National Maritime Museum.

We had lunch at The Spanish Galleon that serves Fish & Chips and Shepherd Neame beers.

We had wanted to find a place that makes excellent and authentic --- if such thing exists --- fish & chips, but once again were disappointed. This again was fast food quality.

The fish croquettes were no better.

We enjoyed the dessert beers at Old Brewery.

From Greenwich we followed Thames Path along the river.

A short beer break at The Dog and Bell pub.

And then another break at The Blacksmith's Arms.

After 14 kilometers of walking we were at Tower Bridge.

Newly renovated London Bridge Station.

Tuesday was our last full day in London.

We took the train from North Wembley to Dalston Kingsland. When ascending from the station we were at a market selling anything from cheap mangoes to cheap clothing.

And eggs.

A bit farther in a hippier neighborhood we found Footnote Cafe.

For brunch we had poached eggs on sourdough, with crispy kale, blanched asparagus, tenderstem broccoli, radish, and orange-honey-mustard dressing (pictured), and fried egg on home-baked pitta bread, with halloumi, butter bean humus, tomato, shallots, and parsley. With cappuccinos and espressos that made 30 pounds.

We continued our walk on this (again) very hot day through Hackney spotting some interesting establishments on our way. This place was not open yet.

But this was.

Unfortunately they were out of most of their beers because of the bank holiday the day before. We had their Word lager, Source pale ale, and Ripper Session IPA, the last drops of them.

Our nonchalant company.

From The Laine Brewery we continued to Hackney Wick, a newly flourishing cultural hub that has attracted art and design studios, and micro breweries to start up in old industrial and warehouse buildings.

With the help of Google Maps (which was not of much help) we tried to locate Crate Brewery, where we had small beers: Steam, Session IPA, IPA on CO2, and IPA on cask.

The Crate's bar was constructed from old railroad sleepers.

Just 30 meters away was the UKs first dedicated tank bar, Howling Hops, another nice brewery in this old industrial / warehouse building complex.

They had many more beer choices available. We tasted a couple of their pale ales, chocolate stout, ruby red, NE IPA and das Kolsch, and munched sweet potato chips.

View from Hackney Wick station.

On Wednesday morning we were on our way back to Stansted airport.