Went to the British Museum today. Huge doesn’t begin to describe it. Took lots of pics. More pics than I know what to do with. While I figure that out, here’s a small gallery to whet your appetite. Click on the head to see the pics:

“Hey man, don’t badmouth the head!”

Waterloo Pl., Trafalgar Square, Whitechapel, Downing St. – View the gallery

Shot thru a bus window, so forgive the reflections and quality.

Today was art show, Trafalgar Square, Whitehall, crowds, walk, bus, walk-walk-walk-walk-Apple store-bus-walk-walk-warehouse-artstuff-walk-misspelled bagel-walk-bus-tube-tube-shop-bus-collapse in a whimpering heap. I’ve prepared a map of the photographic part. Items of note:

• 1. Where we got off the bus
• 2. Notaw’s art show
• 3. Path past statue of Frederick, Duke of York
• 4. Back to Notaw’s art show…still artsy
• 5. Trafalger Square, massive Admiral Nelson, smaller Charles I, throngs of people
• 6. Lunch at an Italian place where they put on airs for the tourists
• 7. Downing St., throngs of schoolchildren in silly hats, heavy security

  Photos to come when I get to them. Just to whet your appetite, here’s today’s theme:

  

  THE GLORIOUS DEAD!!!!

A short history of Brixton

A fascinating little timeline of Brixton. From a roman road crossing, to upper middle class, to working class, to immigrants, and now an up and coming neighborhood back to some posh.

Today was for taking it somewhat easy and recovering a bit. And taking pictures. (Click here for the full gallery). After some coffee and waking up, it was off to Brockwell Park. Walking distance from Notaw’s place, and there’s a food place in the middle of the park that serves breakfast all day. Kids playing soccer and tennis there, some picnics going on, and tons of open greenery. The trees conceal much of the skyline and outside city, but it can be a bit jarring when you walk too far and see the tall building right behind that row of trees. Nice place though.

After some walking and wandering, we came to a Victorian garden inside the park. All kinds of flowers and plants in a charming and morally upstanding presentation. And a fancy building to conceal the bathrooms! Many pictures later, it was off to the grocery store for some essential foodstuffs. And the Polish bakery too. Stocked up, it was back to the flat to rest my legs. I should have packed a car…

Didn’t have the time or energy for much shooting on Saturday, but I did get a few pictures of the Brixton skyline. Notaw’s been doing an ongoing photo a day project for this view, and there are 247 Days worth here.

Arrived safely in London on Saturday, although a bit crazed. The flight itself was uneventful. Saw a bit of the Irish coast, pretty beaches. Clouds over most everything else. Thought to myself that the Irish Coast was looking like a better pick. Of course many beaches look better from 30,000 feet than they do from 6 feet, so I don’t know.

When we got within spitting distance of London (1:30 PM local time), the pilot announced that we’d do a circle while waiting for a runway. Got a nice view, finally down low enough that clouds weren’t a problem. Saw a bridge, a ferris wheel (county fair this week?), lots of buildings and fields and stuff. Then we landed, and the real fun began. There was no room at the terminal, so they parked the plane out in the boonies and drove a ramp up to it. A steep, leaky (it was raining), wet ramp. At the bottom there was a bus. Standing room only ride to the terminal, then the long walk to Immigration and a line as bad as any DMV office I’ve ever been to. By 3PM, I was out of Immigration and on my way to baggage claim. Hung out for awhile, no bags. About 3:30 they announced that the baggage would be delayed a bit due to a shortage of “baggage tugs.” They continued making announcements about other problems every few minutes, and it was about 4:15 before I had suitcase in hand for Customs. Oddly enough, Customs was the easiest part of the whole terminal experience.

The next hurdle was transportation. I decided to go with a coach (something between a bus and a Super Shuttle), and then meet Notaw at the train station. The alternatives involved taking the Underground with several transfers, and after pretty much 24 hours awake (with only an hour or so of semi-napping on the plane) I was in no shape to navigate that. But to take a coach, I had to find the central bus station. Only took me about 45 minutes to get there, and another 45 minutes spent waiting for the coach. Then an hour or so in hellish traffic to get to Victoria. Easy!

Digression time: if you’ve every played a slot machine in Vegas, you’re ready to play the English equivalent: pay phones. The stickers on them make outlandish claims about 60p for 20 minutes. They lie. I made a call at the aiport to report my arrival. Put in 60p, dial, and after 30 seconds it starts blinking “out of time” messages. Keep feeding it money to get more time. An almost constant stream of coins. And just like Vegas, when you run out of money the fun is over. If you plan to ever need a phone here, you better bring a few rolls of coins.

Anyway, I made it to Victoria sometime after 6, met up with Notaw, and took a series of tubes and busses to his place. Got settled in, had a beer. Amazingly, I was recovered enough to venture out again for some drinking with his friends later Saturday night. Or maybe I was in a weakened mental state and just stupid, I don’t know. Walk-bus-train-train-train-walk to bar #1 in north London. The kind of bar that stops serving at 11. Beer and Walk-walk to bar #2. Beer-beer. And back to Brixton. Buuuuuuuuuuus-walk. Sleep-sleep-sleep.

The Journey of thousands of miles starts with 3 hours sitting at your local airport.

I dropped off Legba and fought my way through confusing airport signs and rush hour traffic. Home by 5pm. Hour to go before the flight takes off and I can do some flight tracking.

Legba called and is still sounding in good spirits. He was able to find an outlet and send an email for the travel pages.

From Legba:

“The Flight leaves from Gate 25, but seating there is very full. Sitting at
gate 22…empty, free outlet, perfecto. The “show up early” turned out to
be a lie, probably meant to get me to spend more money at the airport. BA
counter person at baggage check-in said flight would be leaving ~8:15,
boarding 7:30, and I should head for security around 7. The actual
security only took 15 min or so. Appears I passed.

They have a tiny Borders store here. Got a cheap Kurt Vonnegut paperback.
It won’t brand me as an evildoer (I hope). Once I got past security, I
went to the local sports bar and got the last free table. Sat about 10minutes waiting for service. Ended up offering the other seats to a couple
from Portland, Mike and Donna. Nice folks, huge Suns fans.

They spotted a
Suns player walking by, and Mike got to shake his hand. Mike went to the
bar and got us drinks too. Big draft, not enough to be drunk, but enough
to take the edge off a bit.

Not sure how soon the actual boarding will start. Hopefully before too
terribly long. “