Weekend #5: Portabello Road, Abbey Road, and Greenwich

We can't believe we're over the halfway point of our trip here. Mike and I were just talking about how we've settled into our work routines to the point where it doesn't feel like we live in a foreign country anymore.

This weekend we went to Portabello Road to check out the market.

Oh, the madness...

We also headed to Abbey Road studios.

Then on Sunday we went to Greenwich with Payal and Kapil.

As a UNESCO World Heritage Site, Greenwich is famous for two things. #1: Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), and #2: Its naval history.

Greenwich is the place from where all time zones are measured. We had to get a pic of me in one hemisphere and the baby in the other hemisphere.

The Meridian Line is an imaginary line which runs from the North to the South Pole (also Zero Longitude).

And the view from the Royal Observatory our favorite!

We also saw the National Maritime Museum & Royal Naval Academy (outside only).

Here we are doing our sailor poses!

We had dinner at a local pub where we ordered the worst (and most expensive) nachos ever.

Here is the town of Greenwich.


The Queen's Palace.

This is Mike's mad face (he had to work for part of the day and met up with us later in Greenwich). Oh so cute!

And last but not least, here is a picture of our favorite street sign in Greenwich. If anyone knows what it means, feel free to enlighten us.

Weekend #4: Chelsea / Kensington / Notting Hill / Hyde Park

Okay so the baby belly is getting bigger. We captured it on camera this weekend -- this pic is for our moms.

This weekend we wanted to really get to know the city where we live. Thanks to Julie we have a superbly fascinating London walking tour book with the history of each neighborhood (thanks Julie's BYU study abroad). It took us two days to cover Kensington, Chelsea, Hyde Park, and Notting Hill.

On the way to our Chelsea tour, we headed to lunch at The Troubadour. This is where Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and Paul Simon all played in the '60s. It is still an ultra-artistic cafe.

Here are some pics of our walking tour.

There are a bajillion houses of famous people in this city (particularly in the areas we visited this weekend). I am perpetually amazed at how influencial this city has been over the centuries. Rockers, philosophers, authors, poets, playwrites, artists, politicians, etc.

Here's me thinking, "These neighborhoods are too charming!"

Here was Mike's favorite - speaker's corner in Hyde Park (not that he agreed with any of the speakers). He had to go around an listen to everyone while I sat patiently waiting. He reported back the topics of the day, including: "God is too big for one religion" (young guy wearing a likewise printed T-shirt), "Foreigners do not belong here" (upset old lady with long grey ponytail), "You are all damned to hell" (American-accented preacher in cowboy hat), "Muslims are all evil" (don't remember what this guy looked like), and someone in his suit and tie standing singing Jewish songs - this guy was the coolest - it was the only one I liked to listen to.

Mike: "Hey, it's Shackleton!" (Hero of the Featherstone men.) Mike made sure to point out his sweet Burberry jacket. We haven't tracked down the James Caird yet, but plan to do so soon.

Gotta love Marble arch. (In case you were wondering about my absurd choice in apparel for July, my response to you would be: "No, it was not warm in London this weekend, thank-you-very-much.")

We learned that the "Mews" were stables for the wealthy on the back of their mansions. Most mews today have been turned into ultra luxurious residences. This was our favorite Mews street in Notting Hill. They all had little doors by the side of the stable doors - we decided they were for the house elves.

This pic is for my sister. And yes, that is a unicorn above the door. We figured Heather will probably move here some day.

Favourite London shops

We went to Chelsea and Kensington this weekend (post to come) and I found my new favourite stores.

India Jane:

& Designer's Guild:

Both to die for.

I love my fam.

Sitting at my office late on a Friday night (procrastinating working and waiting to go meet Mike for Indian food) I felt like writing a post. I pulled out some of my favorite pics to write about since I have nothing new to post.

My favorite family-to-be pic. Mike is going to be the best dad. This is Emmie our first ever niece--she is the cutest little girl. I also like this pic because my tummy was still small.

Not anymore...

My bro Brian is in New Mexico for the summer (although obviously not in this pic). I wish I could go visit him this summer like the rest of my fam...

Yey for my mom. She is such the hottie. She is going to make a great grandma soon.

These girls are also my fam. Annie and Shanny I miss you and wish you could be here with me. I am holding out for us meeting up in Paris next year...

Weekend #4: Cotswolds, Blenheim Palace, Oxford

So this last weekend we decided to see the sights outside London. Erin's been wanting to check out the Cotswolds, and in addition, we worked in a few side trips as we ventured out of the concrete jungle. We rented a Nissan Note (automatic, of course) at Heathrow on Saturday morning and headed out.

When I first got behind the wheel, I was a little nervous...

But after getting on to the motorway for a while I was good to go.

We stopped get fill up at one of the service stations on the M4 and as a reward I got myself a Yorkie bar. These things are especially cool because of the wrapper, which specifies the gender the bar is intended for:

IT'S NOT FOR GIRLS!

Erin wanted some. I agreed to give her a few bites, rationalizing that it would ultimately be going to our son.

For all you British "The Office" fans out there, on the way out of town we decided to stop by and see how David, Dawn, Tim, Gareth and the rest of the crowd at Wernam Hogg were getting on...

Then we decided to stop by and see Neil and company at the Swindon branch...

And finally, we made it to the Cotswolds (region details here). We ended up seeing half a dozen or so towns, but our favorites were Upper and Lower Slaughter, a pair of towns connected by a small stream. They were picture-perfect. I think they even won the cutest town in England award. We've tried to capture some of their charm here.

Erin bought a white, flowery umbrella that she's named 'Umby.' I'm not exactly sure how I ended up with Umby in this picture, but I would like to say I don't usually prance around in small English towns with girly umbrellas.

We loved this church in Lower Slaughter. The cemetary in front was pretty cool, too.

It was kind of rainy that day, but it made for some cool, misty, cloudy shots.

This is me and the town sign. For being the prettiest town in England, I'll admit the name doesn't quite match. The best thing about this town is that there were hardly any crowds, unlike some of the other Cotswold towns we drove through like Chipping Norton and Moreton-on-Marsh which were crawling with buses and picture-snapping tourists.

Here's a shot of Upper Slaughter Manor, which Erin loved and which we will be building a replica of if we ever build a house. It was amazing, but we couldn't get too close.

The gate to Upper Slaughter Manor kept us (the unwashed masses) out. We tried to raise a mob in the adjoining town to storm the mansion and bring down the nobles inside, but no one wanted to come along. Also, I looked for pitchforks and torches but to no avail. Maybe next time.

We ended up in Guiting Power around dinner and stopped by The Hollow Bottom for some supper. I had chicken with grilled goat cheese, and Erin had a proper English meal of cold ham, fried eggs, and chips. Mmmmmm.

Here's a shot of the countryside on our drive. The drivers here were crazy; we took our lives into our hands stopping on the side of the road to get this shot.

Saturday night we stayed in the town of Ettington, just a few miles down the road from Stratford-upon-Avon. This is me standing outside the reception building. Sunday morning we tried to find the Evesham Branch, which, according to the church website, met at this high school in Evesham, founded sometime in the 17th century. We didn't find anyone except the janitors.

We now have two branches that we've tried to find (Lagos and this one) that no longer meet at the location listed on the website. I think we need to let the webmaster know...

'Where are the Mormons?!...'

After crashing and burning on attempting to go to church, we spent the rest of the morning driving around a few more towns and working our way to Oxford. Here were are in Bourton-on-the-Hill. This is our trusty steed, the Nissan Note. This thing got 55 mpg & the most killer electric blue paint I've ever seen. I need one of these back home...

All the towns were beautiful, but this one was on the hill overlooking the countryside.

We originally planned to head to Oxford on the drive back to London, but saw signs for Blenheim Palace (it was on the way) and decided to make a detour to check it out. Winston Churchill was born here and today it's a UNESCO world heritage site.

You can't take pics inside the palace, but here are some shots of the outside. We toured the main palace and then took a special tour of the private living quarters of the Duke of Marlborough.

We're currently on the 11th Duke; the first Duke was given the palace by Queen Anne as a reward for beating the French at the Battle of Blenheim in the early 17th century.

Finally, we made it to Oxford. It's a cool town and was definitely hopping that Sunday afternoon. We had Cornish pasties for lunch and took the long way to Christ Church, which is what Erin REALLY wanted to see (more on that below).

This is the view toward Christ Church--the tower is part of the grounds. I am looking especially hardcore in this picture.

The Oxford grounds are quite stunning, and the list of names of people who studied here is simply amazing. As a result, we added Oxford to the list of colleges we will pay for our kids to attend (BYU, U of Chicago, and now Oxford).

Here's entry to the Great Hall at Christ Church, the real reason we came to Oxford...

Harry Potter fans might remember this staircase from the first movie...

The Christ Church Great Hall inspired the Hogwart's great hall in the movies, and is where the students still eat their meals everyday. The menu looked delicious...

All in all, it was a great trip and I kept thinking how lucky my friends JT and Mejkin were for living in this area. The sights were beautiful, the food was fresh, and the experience unforgettable. The Cotswolds truly are in the Heart of England.