So it's spring in London, although it's still bloody cold the days are starting to get longer (it's actually light when I get up for work now) and the weather is starting to get a little less bone chillingly cold!
Below is a flash back to mid January when it snowed in London!
Barclay's bikes covered in snow!
It snowed overnight and I was pretty excited to walk to work in the snow, despite it being totally freezing! Having said that, the snow lasted for about half a day and by the time I had left work it had all melted. Seeing as it doesn't always snow each year in London I will just take what I can get!
To keep ourselves busy Michael and I have been going out with friends, visiting lots of new pubs and generally trying to get out and about and trying to make the most of the weekend.
We visited a really cool bar in central London to have after work drinks with my friend Denholm and some of his mates. They had delicious cocktails, including jelly beans and fruit loops, so I couldn't resist having a few!
Michael and I were responsible adults (haha) and left pretty early so I could actually be alive on Saturday morning but I think Denholm partied on into the night haha!
That same weekend was our room mate Lucy's 30th birthday! Woo! We grabbed cocktails at a really cool bar in Shoreditch (the best part of East London), below is me with an amazing jam jar cocktail - they were pretty pricey but totally worth it.
Below is a group shot of us with Lucy and some of her mates at a cocktail bar in Shoreditch. There were plenty more photos taken by Lucy on a really old school camera, she actually has to go and get them processed so might be waiting a while on those ones!
During the half term school break Michael took a day off work and we ventured out of London to the southern seaside town of Brighton, it was only a 1.5 hour journey and a pretty easy train ride to get there.
Brighton is famous for being a small seaside town with a rocky beach, additionally, it has a huge pier complete with amusement rides and a timezone-style video game area.
As you can tell by our clothes it was pretty damn cold while we were there but I imagine it would be nice in summer! It was nice to get out of London and walk along the seaside for the afternoon, although the beaches here don't have that same salty beach smell as the ones in Australia (or maybe I was too focused on keeping warm to notice).
Brighton also has a huge ferris wheel by the beach, it had a kind of similar vibe to Santa Monica Pier in LA, pretty chilled and custom made for the summer months, however few of them there are here in the UK.
After strolling through the small winding alleys and along the beach we headed to this super cool looking old school pub for some customary fish and chips (featuring peas, of course).
We also indulged in a delicious cupcake and coffee each at a cute little bakery down the road.
Above: Michael having a stroll along the rocky beach.
Unfortunately, in true English style, the weather took a turn and it more or less poured rain for the rest of the day. Most of the things to do in Brighton involve walking around outdoors, so after a short period of braving the rain we pretty much gave up and headed home on the train back to London.
Months ago I had booked some special deal tickets to the Thriller Live musical - a night of listening to Michael Jackson music being performed live. The tickets came with a free dinner at what turned out to be a super innovative and funky restaurant. I ordered a white chocolate martini and it was probably the most delicious cocktail I have ever had in my life - heaven!!
This restaurant had the coolest ordering system I have ever seen. The whole table was an interactive computer, it was projected onto the table. You can see Michael in the photo below perusing the menu using the computer mouse in the corner of the table - the meal he is looking at comes up on your plate so you can a visual of what you are about to order before you place your order. So you scroll through the menu and images and then press order and your order is taken! When you want the bill you just ask for it and the waiter brings it over. It was really cool! You can also change the colour of your table cloth, play games, look up directions or order a taxi - what an amazing idea!!
After our fun restaurant experience we headed to see Thriller!
The tickets we had were amazing! We were only a few rows from the front and had an amazing view! The show itself was really fun, I had forgotten how many awesome songs Michael Jackson sang! There were several singers that played the role of Michael Jackson: a Jackson Five MJ, a black MJ, a semi black MJ, the 'Thriller' MJ and a white MJ. One of the Michael Jackson look alikes was an incredible dancer but obviously couldn't sing as he mimed the words, however, it seemed like his uncanny resemblance to MJ and his phenomenal dance moves got him by!
In other news we have had to move flats AGAIN! Our landlord is in the process of selling our old flat so we were asked to move out. Before we left we had to make the most of our amazing social flat so we had some friends around for drinks to celebrate our flat moving (any excuse!).
It didn't take long for the dress up box to emerge and everyone got a little bit of gear on!
The final CP15 gang - our roommates Ray (who has unfortunately abandoned us...sad face) and Lucy who has moved into a new flat with us.
It's safe to say, as with most CP15 gatherings, things escalated pretty quickly. I think this picture below of Ray and Michael, in the early hours of the morning, pretty much explains what kind of a night we all had!
On my final walk home from work to CP15 I was lucky enough to have a nice sunny walk home, which is rare in London, this is a photo of a church near Spitalfields market and the famous Ten Bells Pub (where Jack the Ripper found one of his victims).
Onto some photos of our new apartment!
We only moved a few suburbs over to a suburb, still in East London, called Dalston. Dalston actually has a similar vibe to Shoreditch (our old flat), in that there are heaps of pubs, bars and restaurants right on our doorstep. It's a pretty fun area and there is always stuff going on, as an added bonus there is a giant supermarket that is literally about 100m from our apartment.
We had a pretty horrible move to be honest, when we arrived at the apartment all the things the estate agent promised would be fixed were not fixed (and 2 weeks later, a lot of things STILL have to be fixed, including the toilet and extractor fan in the bathroom!) and then our moving van that Michael borrowed from work got a flat battery - it was a long and painful day.
We have been moved in for almost two weeks now and although there are still things missing I took some fairly ok photos of our new place. Starting with our room...
Michael and I have the master bedroom. We bought our own king bed off Gumtree and it's actually really nice for a second hand bed frame!
As you can see below we have a little ensuite with everything we need. It's a lot smaller than our other bedroom but just as nice and with plenty of room seeing as we really don't have all that much stuff. We have a big mirrored wardrobe as well so plenty of storage room.
The living room and kitchen are really nice!
As you can see in the photo below, which is taken when entering the kitchen and living area we have a big living area with plenty of room for a couch and dining table. The kitchen is compact but really nice and everything is really new. Behind the tv you can see our balcony, we are on the 8th floor so we have a really sweet view - we cannot wait until summer and plan on firing up the BBQ on the balcony at the earliest possible opportunity.
Below is our new couch! We bought this on Gumtree second hand and took it to this new apartment. Getting it into the apartment was one of the hardest things we have ever had to do in our lives! Michael, Luke (our new roommate) and I had to carry/shove/drag/push this couch up 8 flights of stairs - OH MY GOD! It was a tight squeeze and the couch is not only huge but so damn heavy! After over an hour of sweating and a lot of swearing we finally got it into the apartment.
Thank god it fits perfectly!
This is the living room from another angle, you can see Michael enjoying himself on the couch!
We have ordered a table and chairs online, they haven't arrived yet so we are using an old table that Michael found in the hard rubbish and kinda nailed back together. It's not great but it is a good substitute while we wait for our brand new table and chair set (notice that there are only 3 chairs but 4 of us live here?!)
As I said earlier, we have a really nice balcony and I since I have to get up so early I have been lucky to catch a few pretty nice sunrises from the balcony - pretty sweet view don't you think!?
Michael, contemplating life while looking at our view across North/East London.
After our horrible moving weekend we decided to spend the next weekend checking out our new local area.
First of all Michael and I headed out for brunch at a really nice cafe about 5mins from our apartment. You might night believe this but Michael tired an EGG DISH!
I also had an amazing brunch, eggs royale mmmm!!
Later that night we also went out and checked out some of the nightlife in Dalston. We went to this cool little restaurant (?) that serves American style pizza slices and beer/cocktails. I had two amazing slices of pizza - think this one was with mushrooms and roast pumpkin (the best) and we had some drinks.
Voodoo Rays - our local American pizza and beer stop! There were plenty of really cool looking bars and pubs we will have to check out!
We also spent last Sunday checking out the small town of Greenwhich in South East London - home of the meridian time line!
The first thing we stopped to have a quick look at was Cutty Sark, a British clipper ship that was built in 1869 and is still standing today! There is now a museum and all that jazz but we were happy to just have a look.
We also went via Greenwhich Market, a really cute market with plenty of food and also antiques and cute little gift stores. We ended up coming back later to get some yummy market food for lunch, including delicious cupcakes and cookies for dessert.
From here we began to walk towards the Greenwhich observatory, we walked through a beautiful park and there were heaps of people out and about - with so much space it was hard to believe we were only 40 mins from home!
Some pictures of Michael and I from the Greenwhich Observatory.
Amazing view and beautiful park as seen from the Greenwhich Observatory - below you can see the Maritime Museum and University of Greenwhich - in the background you can see Canary Wharf, which is a huge commercial city type area in East London, just south of the Thames.
The Greenwhich observatory, the actual home of the meridian time line - which unfortunately now costs £10 to view - we could not justify this!
Today, after walking through a nice park near our new flat in London, we kind of stumbled upon Broadway Market - I've always meant to visit here but kinda never got around to it. London has the most amazing open air markets, it's hard to say which is the best! Broadway Market has fresh produce, hot food, baked goods, cold meats and cheeses, desserts, flowers, antiques and pretty much anything else you can name.
As always I was drawn to the food, hence all the photos below.
The tarts in the bottom left photo were too irresistible, I bought two mini ones - one was a pumpkin one and the other was a parsnip, beetroot and tomato tart - YUM!
That's about all the news I have from London for now.
Michael and I have made plans to visit Stonehenge and the town of Bath in the coming month and I am headed to Budapest for the Easter Holidays so there will be more updates coming shortly!
xxx
