Trip journal UK and Spain (September 21 – October 12, 2011)

Part 1: London September 22-29

September 21 (Wed): My wife and I flew to London (23:25 VS201) to visit our daughter. Didn’t sleep much during the flight and watched three movies (‘Just Go With It’, ‘Water for Elephant’ & ‘Gulliver’s Travel’) and skimmed through three (‘Pirates of Caribbean– On Strange Tides’, ‘Thor’ & ‘Kung Fu Panda II’). We arrived almost on schedule.

September 22 (Thurs): My daughter had arranged mini cab pickup and we arrived at her apartment @ Canada Water around 07:15. Before she went to work she shown us the direction to Surrey Quays, a shopping centre adjacent to the Canada Water Underground. We shopped at the Tesco superstore and Holland & Barratt. We also did some reconnoitering before heading home.

September 23 (Fri): We visited Tate Modern (again but didn’t use our daughter’s corporate passes as all exhibitions that day were free). Before we went to the gallery we applied for our Freedom Pass (free travel pass for older and disabled Londoners) at a post office near the Southwark Underground station. After a quick lunch at the gallery (Tate Café) we crossed over to St. Paul Cathedral via the Millennium bridge. We spent about an hour at One New Change (a relative new office and shopping mall) and revisited the street of my former office (Aldermary House) at Queen Street (EC4N). We’d dinner at the Mandarin Kitchen, Queensway, with our daughter that evening.

September 24 (Sat): We looked at some apartments for sales at Wapping and Maida Vale in the morning. After a brief stay at St. John’s Wood High Street we had our salted beef sandwiches at The Brass Rail, Selfridges (plus frozen yogurt @ Pinkberry). We did some shopping across the street @ M&S before heading home. Our daughter had to go back to her office. For September she’d clocked over 300 hours of work and also needed time (and energy) to write her master degree thesis (due end of October). My poor girl!

September 25 (Sun): We joined a 2012 London Olympic games sites tour (£9 per person). The tour meeting point is the Bromley-by-Bow underground station. After the tour we spent a few hours at the newly opened (September 13, 2011) Westfield Shopping Mall at Stratford (one of the largest urban shopping centres in Europe and the third largest in the UK). In the evening Maggie and I attended the Sunday mass at Our Lady, Queen of Heaven at Queensway.

September 26 (Mon): We’d our lunch at Mange Tout @ the Surrey Quays. After shopping at the Tesco, I went to Argos, Victoria to buy a rice cooker.

September 27 (Tue): We went to Canary Wharf and had dim sum lunch @ the Royal China. We shopped at Waitrose afterwards.

September 28 (Wed): We went to the Regent Street in the morning. First we stopped by the National Geographic Store and then Hamley’s (can’t find any right toys for our 11-month old grandson). After lunch @ the Carnaby Burger @ Foubert's Place, Oxford Circus, Maggie did her shopping and I went to Foyle @ Charing Cross (one of my longtime favorite shops since the ’80s; it’s the world's largest bookshop in terms of shelf area [30 miles/50 km] and number of titles on display) and the National Gallery (another favorite of mine). At 16:30 I went to China Town to meet my wife for some groceries and returned home.

September 29 (Thurs): We went to the Westfield Shopping Mall @ Stratford again. After lunch at Marks & Spencer’s café, I bought an Olympic t-shirt for my grandson at ‘Our Greatest Team’ shop as well as some groceries @ Waitrose before heading home.

Equipment used: Olympus Pen E-P3 – Olympus M. Zuiko Digital 14-42mm F3.5-5.6 II (35mm equiv. 28-82mm), Panasonic Lumix G Vario 45-200mm F4.0-5.5 (35mm equiv. 90-400mm) and Nikon 52mm Circular Polarising filter.