Portraits, burgers and buses!

Today we got up early which is weird because it's Saturday.....

Are we going somewhere?!

I guess we are - we've come to the train station!!!

Well that's our train!!!

We got a window seat and left a CD on the hand grip!

And we're off!!!

Wonder where we're going....

That's Millwall football stadium.

There's the Shard over there!!!

And here's Blackfriars station!  But we didn't get off here....

We got off here!!!

And we waited for a bus - get your Bus Bingo card out!!

We got on a bus and gave them a CD!

According to that sign over there, we're on a number 15 bus!

Where are we getting off then?

We got off here outside Charing Cross Station!!!

That's South Africa House - it's very pretty!

We're at Trafalgar Square!   That's the National Gallery over there!

We like it here!

That's Nelson's Column.....

Ooooooooo that's pretty!

We're going to see the Gauguin expedition!!

We got in half price on our art pass!

It was really interesting - it was all his portraits, well not ALL of them, but lots of them and ones that hadn't been seen here before!  Most were of Gauguin because he thought he was the best portrait to paint.

That's one of his sketches he did of himself!

There were quite a lot of sketches - this one's of his mate, Jean Moreas.

This one's a chalk drawing of Annette Belfils - never seen this one before!

This one's a charcoal sketch of Dutch artist De Haan

And so's this one!

Oh hang on!  I know this picture!!!!  It's L'Arlesienne!!!!!  Turns out that Gauguin drew this sketch and then gifted it to Van Gogh who did the oil painting!!!!!!!

This one's a bronze casting self portrait..... Coo!

This one is of Gauguin's (extremely young) Tahitian wife in a vaguely disturbing picture with ancestral "spirits" in the background.  It's when Gauguin had returned back to Tahiti the second time, to stay there permanently.

This is one of his "surrogate" portraits painted in 1901.  The sunflowers are representative of Van Gogh, who had died 10 years prior to this.
That was a really interesting expedition, mostly because it was the first time a lot of the pictures had been displayed in England!!

After a look in the gift shop (we'll show you later) we used the facilities and left a floppy disc!

Then it was off to lunch!  Where shall we go?

We went round the corner and found these signs!

Then we found a railing to leave a poppy tied to!

And then spotted an art shop over the road!!!  LET'S GO IN!!!

After a spot of shopping (we'll show you in a minute) we went back over the road to have lunch in Byrons!!

Oooooo!!  Oh we can have a play with that later on!!

First of all we ordered a fizzy drink.....

And then we got a burger and fries!!  YUMMMM!

After lunch we had a wander through town and found another flamingo!!!

Then it was a short walk back to Trafalgar Square.....

And along the Strand!  That's the Zimbabwean Embassy, you know

And then we spotted the Savoy Hotel!!!!  That's an art deco building you know! Let's go take a look!

That's a Lalique crystal fountain!

Do you see the fish, now?!

Wowzers...... they'd never let riffraff like us in there, you know....

And over the road there's another fancy building!

We went and had a quick look round Covent Garden....

Very noisy though so we didn't stay long.

Then it was back to the bus stop and another Bus Bingo moment!

We got on a bus and gave them a CD!

We're going past the Royal Courts of Justice here!

Ooo there's a fancy clock!

And that's St Paul's Cathedral!

That's the Bank of England over there, with the pillars.  They keep lots of gold in there.

That was the number 11 bus!!!

We're going to Spitalfields Market!!!

On the way, we left a poppy in a tree!

See?!  There's a goat over there!!

We had a good wander round the market - we didn't get stuck in this one though, so we didn't have to pay £4 to get out.  We did find the Cafe Art stall (but forgot to take photos!!!) and we bought a desk calendar from Richard.  (we'll show you later!)

On the way back, we tied a CD to a sculpture!

This one's been found and claimed already!!

Then it was back to the bus stop again.

That used to be a fire station!!

Ooo sparkly lights!!

We left a CD on the bus too!

Wonder where we're going......

We went past some elephants!!  Can you see them?!

Those are posh houses.....

And we got off here - that was the 205 bus!!

We're here, outside Kings Cross Station!  It's nearly time to go home.....

First of all we left another poppy on this railing!

And put a floppy disc over here!

Then it was off to the station!

We did a spot of shopping in here (we'll show you later!)

And did some shopping here at the Laduree concession!!  HURRAH!

(we'll show you later!)

Then we used the facilities and left another floppy disc!

Then it was off to get our train - we only had to wait eight minutes!

AND we got a window seat!!!

We're going through Blackfriars station again, but it's dark now!

You can just about see the Shard through the window!

We left our last floppy disc on the hand rail on the train!

And then we all had a snooze because we were pooped out!

Luckily we didn't have to get off until the last stop!!!

Almost home!

AND there was a bus waiting for us outside!  How fab is that!!

And then we got off here at the top of our street.

So - here's our shopping!  That's the free booklet we got at the expedition, and also the pack of postcards!!!  We got them discounted because the expedition finishes soon!

That one's rather creepy!

Here's the desk top calendar we got!

That picture was signed for me by the chap that took the photo!!!

He spelt my name wrong but we don't mind!

That's the picture for June!

That's the coffee we got at the Fortnums shop!

And that's the cayke!

That was our dinner!!!

Oh what a fun day out!!!