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Sunday 4 May 2008

Tourist

Yesterday we had a grand day out in London. I managed to get up jolly early and off we sailed (with Cocotte, Doggy and Hubby) for the white cliffs of Dover, zoomed up the M25 and parked for free at Lakeside. Yes, it's not especially central I know, but I ain't paying 30 quid for parking. Plus we got dirt cheap day returns with unlimited zone 1-6 travel so it was a double bargain. Yay.

We went to Tower Bridge:

Tower Bridge

We saw the huge queues for tickets to the Tower of London:

Queues for the Tower of London

Lucky we hadn't thought "hmm, let's visit the Tower of London", eh?

We spent rather a lot of time on the Tube:

"Mind the gap"

We stopped off at some little-known monuments:

Big Ben

And I spent ... not very much money at all. I went in Selfridges (Pink shirt) and Next (linen trousers and a top). Who'd have thought. And I didn't even set foot in Waterstone's (always a good way to avoid book-buying, because if I go in, I buy). But I bought two books on the boat. I couldn't help it. I was sort of overcome.

Doggy was absolutely the most best-behaved (and, naturally, beautiful) ever seen on the Tube. She was even allowed to come shopping in Selfridges where all the assistants swooned over her (she has that effect on everyone). She really was such a good dog.

We didn't get home until half past midnight (having risen at 5.30am Sat morning) so we were all pretty knackered but we had a fab day out. I don't know why we don't do it more often. Oh yes I do: requires 1 tank of petrol; requires dog-sitter or trip to vet (to be charged to give her the same worming tablet we give her at home); high-risk of retail spending; requires getting up stupidly early. Still, it was indeed a grand day out!

PS - we didn't go on Eurostar because Cocotte is quite claustrophobic and that much time in a tunnel, under the sea would just have been too much. Plus they don't allow dogs. And we hadn't arranged for a dog-sitter.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like a fab day out! Next time you're here, if you fancy meeting for a coffee, let me know!
xx

Loth said...

A pretty comprehensive day out, all things considered. I too stopped going into bookshops as I couldn't be trusted. Then I discovered ReadItSwapIt.co.uk. Sigh. More piles of books to find space for.
Thanks for popping over to mine for a comment - always nice to hear from new people!

Anonymous said...

Oh, nice pictures! I haven't been to London in ages, I want to come back for a proper visit -- the last few times I was there I was in transit, catching planes.

I used to go there a lot when I was a teen, it wasn't that expensive at the time (plus England had fashionable bell-bottom pants, hype in the 90s)

Lis of the North said...

Hi folks. We did indeed have a grand day!
SG: you never know I might take you up on that ;)
loth: Hello! Bookshops are dangerous places are they not? I once asked in Waterstone's when they were going to start providing trolleys... Hmm, maybe not!
Zhu: salut! Well, it's a bit easier for me to pop to London for the day I guess ;) Oh no, in transit in London. You too have suffered Heathrow airport?!