London

Our long awaited holiday finally rolled around on the 26th of June.  The six of us flew out of a wintery Auckland at the end of June to spend what was to be three glorious, hot, eventful, stimulating and WONDERFUL weeks in Europe!  London was our first stop and to my mind, is an incredible city.  I was immensely impressed by the city's cleanliness, the amazing and huge parks, the gorgeous architecture, the underground and all in all I found London to be an extremely organized and well run city. 

We fitted a lot into our few days in London starting off of course with the "must dos" such as Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, the London Tower and Madame Tussauds.  Sarah, Chantelle, Camilla (occasionally dragging Catherine along with them) shopped themselves silly and in the process walked Oxford Street up and down a good few times. 

We met (and Randel got reacquainted with) his lovely cousin Siobhan and her husband, Andrew who drove down to London to spend the day with us.  Randel and I managed an afternoon to ourselves which saw us doing a lovely walk and ending up in Carnaby Street enjoying a wine and a beer whilst watching the "unfortunates" rushing from work to the Tube. 

The weather in London was perfect in the mid-20s with just the occasional shower (which nearly saw Randel's eyes taken out by the hundred of umbrellas springing open around him)  :)  We conquered the underground (which is really quite easy to use and very efficient) and a couple of the girls even used it on their own a few times.  Most of all I could not get enough of the architecture and the beautiful green parks (having visited Hyde Park, Regents Park and Green Park).

Now that I have had a taste of this beautiful city, I can't wait to visit again.

THE AWESOME ENTRANCE TO HYDE PARK

 

TOPSHOP

(the long awaited shopping begins....)

 

 

OUR LOCAL TUBE STATION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WELL, TWO OF THEM LOOK HAPPY TO BE HALFWAY THERE...

 

 

 

 

LEICESTER SQUARE

 

RED TELEPHONE BOOTH AND CAMERA....I HAD TO :) 

 

 

THE VIEW FROM RANDEL AND MY PUB HIDEOUT AFTER HAVING ESCAPED FROM THE FOUR HAPPY SHOPPERS FOR A FEW HOURS

 

 

OUR BEAUTIFUL APARTMENT IN EARLS COURT (THERE WERE SQUIRRELS IN THOSE TREES)

PUB LUNCH WITH SIOBHAN

 

 

 LOVED THE LONDON TAXIS

 

RANDEL AFTER HELPING BRUCE OUT OF A TOUGH SPOT AT MADAME TUSSAUDS

CATHERINE ATTEMPTING TO STEAL CAMILLA'S PURSE

 

THE GATES TO BUCKINGHAM PALACE BEFORE OUR LOOOONNNNG WAIT FOR THE CHANGING OF THE GUARDS (AFTER I SUCCEEDED IN GETTING THE TIMES WRONG)



ALL SHOPPED OUT