Had a brilliant weekend in London and celebrated in style. We went down on the train on friday and stayed at the Regents Palace hotel. The name was quite misleading as it most certainly was not a 'palace'. It is a large hotel, very central with Picadilly Circus tube station just outside. Some of the rooms have bathroom facilities and some have no facilities with bathrooms located on each floor. Our room had facilities which reminded me of being in a caravan. It was a tiny bathroom unit and you could literally have a wee, shower and clean your teeth at the same time. The room had a musty smell to it but it was clean and to be honest we hardly spent any time in our room. We dumped our bags and went to Lords to collect our tickets for the next day. After Lords we went to Sloane Square to get Sparks some new shoes.
That evening we met Mr T. in Wapping and had a tour of his local hostelries and made arrangements for meeting him at Lords the day after.
The following day we had a big breakfast and set off to Lords. We bought sandwiches for the day on the way there and took along a bottle of wine each. It was all very civilised and the weather did manage to hold up for most of the day. The cricket started 15 minutes late due to a rain shower but luckily that was the only one. We weren't over enamoured with our seats as we found that our view of the big screen was restricted. Sparks suggested that we go to the ticket office to see if we could upgrade our tickets. The ticket office agreed and gave us a free upgrade so we had cracking seats.
I've never sat through a full game of cricket before and I expected to be quite bored. I was pleasantly surprised as it was quite entertaining, the wine flowed and the smoked salmon sarnies were delicious. I could barely see the ball after a couple of glasses of wine but still managed to follow what was going on. At lunchtime we met Mr T and his friends and had a glass of champagne then we went back to watch the 2nd innings. All I can say is that Lancashire were robbed but even though we lost it was still a brilliant day.
On Sunday we checked out of our hotel and went for a walk. London is surprisingly easy to get around on foot. We went to Trafalgar Square, had a stoll down the Mall, The Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, the London Eye, Covent Garden and finally finished up in Regent's Park. It was a lovely afternoon in the park, we had a coffee and a stroll through the rose garden before heading to Euston for our train home. The journey home was entertaining to say the least. There were a couple of groups of men on there who had spent the weekend at Twickenham, so there was singing all of the way home. The weather was nice until we hit Lancashire where we were met with rain..............Welcome home.
That evening we met Mr T. in Wapping and had a tour of his local hostelries and made arrangements for meeting him at Lords the day after.
The following day we had a big breakfast and set off to Lords. We bought sandwiches for the day on the way there and took along a bottle of wine each. It was all very civilised and the weather did manage to hold up for most of the day. The cricket started 15 minutes late due to a rain shower but luckily that was the only one. We weren't over enamoured with our seats as we found that our view of the big screen was restricted. Sparks suggested that we go to the ticket office to see if we could upgrade our tickets. The ticket office agreed and gave us a free upgrade so we had cracking seats.
I've never sat through a full game of cricket before and I expected to be quite bored. I was pleasantly surprised as it was quite entertaining, the wine flowed and the smoked salmon sarnies were delicious. I could barely see the ball after a couple of glasses of wine but still managed to follow what was going on. At lunchtime we met Mr T and his friends and had a glass of champagne then we went back to watch the 2nd innings. All I can say is that Lancashire were robbed but even though we lost it was still a brilliant day.
On Sunday we checked out of our hotel and went for a walk. London is surprisingly easy to get around on foot. We went to Trafalgar Square, had a stoll down the Mall, The Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, the London Eye, Covent Garden and finally finished up in Regent's Park. It was a lovely afternoon in the park, we had a coffee and a stroll through the rose garden before heading to Euston for our train home. The journey home was entertaining to say the least. There were a couple of groups of men on there who had spent the weekend at Twickenham, so there was singing all of the way home. The weather was nice until we hit Lancashire where we were met with rain..............Welcome home.