LONDON - FULL DAY OF STOMPING

We got up this morning and had a breakfast at the hotel.  Error!  We were forced to demand coffee.  After that, the rest of the day, fortunately, went beautifully. We first walked to the British Museum Store - one of the greatest museum stores ever.  It had been undergoing renovation the last time I visited, now it's fixed up and gorgeous!

 We began our stroll through Gray's Inns and Lincoln Inn Fields - beautiful buildings and gardens hidden amongst them.  Off to the Temple, then down to the Embankment,  It was a beautiful day with big fluffy clouds and wonderful visibility.  We walked down to Westminster bridge.  A great stroll.

The Griffin is the symbol of London.  These symbols mark the borders of the city sections.

We took the Westminster tube to Leister Square.  Normally, we end up in the square itself, brassy, loud, full of cheap restaurants and touts.  By a slight error, we went into China town.  I don't remember it being as large as it seemed today.  It's probably grown.  By error, again, we wandered into a restaurant called Baozi - we had meat baozta (yum!) and dumpling soup.  Mine was outstanding.  Charlie ordered sweet and sour which was very spicy.  On our way out the door, we found out the place was Zagat rated - I would have, too!

From lunch, we took another tube (we, obviously had a day-pass) to Charing Cross tube station and went to the National Portrait Gallery.  With all our walking, and being leg-weary, we found it interesting anyway.

From there, we took another tube to Piccadilly Circus.  We walked down Regent street to Fortnam and Mason's.  Nothing really appealed, although I was drawn to an "Owl and the pussy cat" lunch box.  Reason prevailed, and I didn't buy it!  We needed a bit of a rest, so we stopped at a Starbucks.  Hey!  They have flat whites here AND lemon cake - the best of Australia and Canada!

We then got on the Green Park tube and went to Covent Garden (ack!  another station with elevators - or 192 steps)  We found some cute kid's T shirts.  Back to the tube then to Tottenham Court Road and walked down to Foyles.  By that point we were getting really foot weary.  We went back to the hotel, got our suitcases out of storage.  It was only 4 pm.  We really didn't want to have dinner - too full - so we decided to go out to the airport on the tube.  We walked to Holborn Station (not too bad) and took the 1 hour ride to Terminal 1, 2, 3.  Outside of Terminal 1 we got a bus to our hotel, Sheraton Heathrow.  Had a nice dinner at the hotel, early bed.  Tomorrow back to LA.  How weird!