By Today was a mixed bag of all the things.
The majority of our day was spent in the Knightsbridge Chelsea area. Not too far from our hotel, but west of where we are vs east where we’ve spent most of our time.
First stop was Sunday morning church. We dropped in on services at Holy Trinity Brompton (HTB) which you have either heard of, or, know of indirectly if you’ve ever seen a billboard or bus advertisement for the Alpha Course. I’m pretty sure you’ve at least seen the signs, they’re everywhere. Anyway HTB is the “birthplace” of Alpha and it was really neat to go and be part of their services. They were friendly and well equipped for visitors, so you didn’t feel like a sore thumb.
After the sacred we headed up the street for about five minutes for the propane. We got to Harrod’s at opening time and it was bananas. The crowd to get in, the range of stuff they sell, the decadence of most of it. Bananas. They had a designer toaster for four hundred pounds. 400. Pounds. I bought two.
They also had tea for twenty five pounds. Had to be hand picked of the bushes by the Queen herself, I don’t know. But wow. I’d already blown my money on toasters so I left it behind.
We had lunch at the coffee counter basically ham and grilled cheese sandwiches with their house baked fresh bread and some tea. My son won’t be going to university now but the sandwiches were delicious and came with fresh dill in endive boats so he will understand.
The hall was filled with every sort of baked good you could want. I’d have liked a bit of all of it, but hats off to Harrod’s for embracing the unicorn craze.
After Harrod’s we headed to Kensington Palace, home of Prince Willam and his family. They did not invite us in for tea but they did let us tour the rest of the place. Seriously some great art and fascinating history. I enjoyed the section on Queen Victoria. I learned that after her husband died, she was a single mom to 9 with the ultimate full time job. That’s worthy of respect in any century. Also, there were jewels.
There was also a really cool display of Princess Diana’s gowns which I thought was awesome since I remembered almost all of them from magazines and stories when I was growing up. From her leaving for her honeymoon outfit to the dress she wore to dance with John Travolta.
Beautiful gardens there as well that connects to a public park just full of people on a sunny day.
After that we went to another famous shopping spot: Primark. It was just as bananas as Harrod’s except everything there is ridiculously cheap and it’s like Black Friday shopping every day.
Shopped out, we went to dinner and had the prerequisite fish and chips. They were sadly only ok, not awesome. But it’s off the list at least.
Our Fitbits are beginning to smoke from all of the use and tomorrow is setting up to be another busy day.
I’ll leave you with this, we thought it was funny. Sacred and Profane in one place.
contentedkitchen 