London town: Walking on Wayne and other attractions Part 1

September 19 - 23, 2015

We took the red-eye to Heathrow, arriving around 10 am , with Wayne and Terry following a bit later from Reykyavik.

We made it!

Lots of stuff.

Heathrow Express to Paddington Station, where we are met by Hilary.  We take the tube to Bermondsey and our London flat, stopping at Sainsbury's for 'grub', as Hilary calls it.

The flat is right on the Thames, if you jumped out the living room window, you'd be swimming.

View from the flat: the Shard and Tower Bridge

 On Sunday, Oyster cards in hand, we set off to see the Rising Tide horse sculptures, by Jason Decaires Taylor.  Four stone horses with riders, set on the bottom of the Thames, near the South Bank, and meant to send a message about fossil fuels and the future.  The horses' heads look like oil well machines.  Two of the riders are well-fed business men and two are children.  At high tide they are submerged, while at low tide we can walk up to them (carefully...it's muddy) and touch them.

Happy campers

Next it's Tower Bridge and lemon ice cream, followed by a walk around the Tower.

for the Granville Ferry Butlers

Our leader

New:  Razor, cheese grater, gherkin.  Od: Tower Bridge

Is it real or is it Memorex?

Our very excellent tour guide consulting map.  We're where??

 After a nap, we took ourselves to Camden Town and the Blues Kitchen, where Sam bar tends and plays.  Good food, swingin' music, loved seeing Sam in his element!

 

Fried oreos....aaaaagh!

 Monday dawned gray and rainy, so we spent the day at the Tate Modern with Agnes Martin (exhibition, that is)

Background:  Agnes Martin Foreground:  Hilary Mackay

Canadians at the Tate Modern

Time for a coffee

Yup!

Did I mention that we ate very well in London?  The best was The Mayflower pub, near our flat, with delicious fish and chips, sweet potato and mushroom pie, ale on draft...

And so ended our first 3 days in London.  Tomorrow it's off to Canada House for the high-light of the trip: seeing Wayne's paintings magically transformed into carpets.