A mystery day out in London!!

Today Andrea got me up really early....... and we went to the train station!!  We had planned to meet up with Sir Woodstock in London but there were major rail chaos at Kings Cross Station (where he would arrive at) over the weekend, so he stayed home.  Then we discovered that the Rembrandt show we were going to see was sold out so we figured we'd go do something else instead.

We saw a spiffy Christmas tree at the station!!!

And we were off!!!  We had a window seat again and all the fields had a dusting of frost on them!  It was pretty!!!

We got off at City Thameslink Station which is near Ludgate Circus so we took that exit.  By now, we'd decided to whizz into the National Gallery to get advance tickets for the Rembrandt show for 11th January (Sir Woodstock might be able to come that day) and then scoot up to the British Museum.

First we stopped in the loo to take a wee and tied a weathergram to the door!!!

And then got a bus and tied a weathergram in there too!!!

We got off the bus and walked past the Savoy Hotel.....

And there's the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square!!!

There's the blue Cockerel on the fourth plinth....

And we found another Paddington Bear!!!  Apparently today is the last day these statues will be in London..... I'm glad we found another one!

That's the back of his jacket!!  I love that jacket!

This one was designed by Boris Johnson, who's the Bear (Mayor) of London.  Most people think he's a bit of an idiot.

And here we are at the Sainsbury Wing.  We went in to get an advanced ticket, and by the ticket desk there was a sign saying they were selling tickets for the 11:30 viewing FOR TODAY!!!  OH!  By the time we got to the front of the line, the time had changed to 12 noon today and then when we got to the ticket desk lady, I asked for a ticket for 12 noon.  She went ummmmmmm well they just sold out but we can do 12:30 - so we said yes, we weren't expecting to get in at all today so we'll have it!!!

So we're going in!!!

We had about an hour and a half to spare, so first of all we spent some money in the gift shop and then did some bookcrossing!!!

Then we had a little wander, and saw these fancy pillars!!!

It was wonderfully clear weather though - you can see the Millenium Wheel in the background there!!

And Big Ben down there!!!

Mystery of the day.  Who the heck's Richard Dadd??

By now it was nearly 12:30 so first we checked our bags into the luggage check at the museum and then took a wee.  We left another weathergram on the toilet door too!!!  Then we went into the expedition to find that half of London was also in the same expedition!!!  There were lots of tiny lithographs and also lots of gorgeous oil paintings but it was three people deep to each painting so they were difficult to see.  And then there was very little room to squeeze through to the next painting.... and by the time we'd reached room four (out of seven) we were getting dirty looks from other people when we said "Excuse me" to get through and we didn't really want to be there any more.  Which is an awful shame.  But we eventually made it out and then collected our bags from the luggage check.
By the time we got to the main entrance, we noticed that they'd sold all the tickets for the whole day!!!

By now we were starving so we went up the road to find somewhere to have lunch.

Wait a minute!!!  Cafe Rouge used to be here and it's called something else now!!!  Our "place to eat" has gone missing!!!

We decided to eat here instead though because we just fancied steak and chips and this place had the best price on it.

Ahh, that's better.  I can relax now.....!!

We got a Well Done Ribeye Steak with Fat Chips which was pretty good.  The steak was a bit dry and it wasn't as good as the Cafe Rouge minute steak though.  But we still ate it all!!!

Then we went up the road to Cass Art but that was packed solid as well, and we were sick and tired of too many people, so we didn't stop in to buy anything.

Then we decided to go down to Covent Garden.

On the way, we found a statue thing for Oscar Wilde!!!

I like that saying...!

Inside the head was lots of green stars!!!

We left another book here too!!!

We found some pretty bricks too.

Oh here we are!!!  Christmas decorations!!!

Here's Covent Garden!

Laduree!!!  Andrea says we're going to buy some cakes!!!  That'll cheer me up from being squashed all morning!!! 

HURRAH!!!!

There were loads and loads of people here too and by now, we'd totally had enough of lots of people so we decided to go home.

We went past the Royal Opera House - there's a ballerina inside that globe that goes round and round!!

Ah, here's where we get the bus back to the station!!!

This is our stop!!

We tied a weathergram to this bus too!!!

And got off here....

Here we are!  The Station where we get our train!!  And Luckily, there was a train home due in five minutes!!

HUH??  Elephants in Castles???  What's that about?!!

On the way back to Brighton, we saw the sun go down!  It was really pretty!

And here we are back at Brighton station!!!

With a bus waiting outside to take us home!!!  I like coming home - but I like days out too!!

This is one of the books we got at the gift shop

And this is the other one.  We've already started reading this and it's REALLY good!!  We got other stuff too, but that's a surprise for someone!!

Ah!  Now this is the important box!!

Mmmmm.... Andrea says that's my dinner tonight!!!  YEAHHHH!!!