With a few hours left before my flight back to NYC, Gabrielle and Andy took me to Windsor. Just outside of town is Windsor Farm Shop, which sells organic produce from Royal Farms and goods from other local specialty producers. Next, we roamed around the shops in the town of Windsor before stopping for sandwiches, tea and scones. A perfect ending to a fantastic trip!

The Long Walk leads to Windsor Castle

Statue of Queen Victoria

The Crooked House of Windsor

Well-lit scooter

After returning from Paris, I spent my last night in London with Diane and Gabrielle. Diane took over my job at CNET in SF when I moved to NY, so we have a lot of friends in common. She moved to Paris a few years ago, and now lives in London, and this was our first opportunity to actually meet in person!

Just about everyone in London recommended Borough Market, one of many open air markets around the city, but this one is centered around food. Unfortunately it’s only active on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, all days I wouldn’t actually be in London. However there are a lot of restaurants and food shops around it, so I decided to pay a visit anyway. I spent the rest of the daylight hours wandering around the South Bank, along the river, and topped off my day with a visit to the Tate Modern.

Monmouth has excellent coffee

Meat pies

Southwark Bridge

Shakespeare’s Globe

Millennium Bridge

London Bridge (if you find yourself singing that song in your head and wondering “is this it?” you can read about the history of the London Bridge here)

City Hall

The Gherkin (30 St Mary Axe)

Tower of London

Tower Bridge (what most people think of as London Bridge)

View down the Thames

Tower of London has some pretty intense history. I would have liked to have toured it if I had more time. Guess I have to go back!

Trinity House

Tower Hill Sun Dial

Shakespeare’s Globe (view from the Millennium Bridge)

Tate Modern

Sunflower Seeds by Ai Weiwei

100 million hand-crafted, hand-painted porcelain sunflower seeds

Tate Modern by night

Monday was my first solo day. I walked to the train station to catch the First Great Western train to London’s Paddington station. From there, I would take the tube to meet a friend from high school at the famous Harrods department store. I hadn’t seen Geraldine since 1994, during my first trip to NY. Since then, she moved to Italy, got married, and became a mom. She happened to be in London visiting her brother, Andrew, who I also hadn’t seen since 1994. Andrew now lives in London. What a fun coincidence!

The town of Henley-on-Thames is in the county of Oxfordshire.

Paddington station

After I roamed around the Food Hall at Harrods and found Geraldine and Carolina, we headed towards Trafalgar Square. Here’s Big Ben peeking over the trees.

And the Eye, across the river

Chinatown

Carolina and Geraldine in Trafalgar Square

The National Gallery

Andrew, Carolina and me (it had started raining after we finished lunch)

Geraldine and I braved the cold, in hopes of meeting royal

Victoria Memorial

Me and Geraldine

Buckingham Palace

Unfortunately, we didn’t get to meet the Queen or any of the Princes.

Signage in the streets for tourists who are used to looking the other way when crossing streets.

Tea at The Ritz

The holidays have arrived in London

Royal Opera House

I got a great deal on a ticket to see “Oliver!” at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane.

Such a fantastic show, with an amazing cast!

Steve the dog fought a battle Sunday night. I’m pretty sure he won.