It was definitely good to leave Wellington on August 29th in the hope of leaving our colds and cold weather behind in search of new adventures for a few weeks.... starting with:





Our trip over was great, as we flew over the US we had great views of the land!  The food we had was good too - nice angus beef burger.

Catherine's dinner

 Monday 1st September

Le Pain Quotidien looking at the queue in the rai

 Our first breakfast was at one of Catherine's favourite places Le Pain Quotidien as the waffles they make are the best that we have ever had!!! 

This photo of David was taken while we were eating.  It was raining and there was a very long queue in the background for people waiting to visit the Transport Museum - we decided to give it a miss :-)

Catherines' favourite waffles at Le Pain Quoiten

Tuesday 2nd September

We decided to head to St Pauls Cathedral and walked along The Strand to get there.  On the way we passed Somerset House. We decided that when we win Lotto we might be able to afford a couple of rooms.  Originally built in 1547 for Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset. The palace finally fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1775 to make way for this building.  It is HUGE!!

Somerset House, The Strand

When we got to St Paul's the chap on reception realised we weren't local, not by our accents, but by the Scott Base jacket David was wearing.  As we went in one of the 'hosts', a lovely chap, offered to take us to the recent memorial to the people who had lost their lives in Antarctica as a result of pursuing science.

The Cathedral is just stunning.  We walked up into the dome of the cathedral where there is a whispering chamber - it is difficult to describe essentially two people sit on either side of the dome and whisper into the wall behind them and the other person will hear it.  It works too!!  We then headed up to the very top of the dome - aproximatley 111 metres high.  Catherine got half way up the last stage and had to stop with vertigo - dang it!  While we were there there was a moment of prayer which was really nice - good to know it is still very much a working church.

A perspective from the whispering chamber... the internal circumference of the dome.

Just stunning inside St Paul's

St Pauls

From St Paul's we took the tub to Camden market.  Dom and Amy who had been staying with us just before we left recommended it.  They also said not to bother with the immediate market shops when you get out of the tube station, but to head over the bridge into another area.  We did this and found that the bridge went over a lock - it was really neat to see it working with boats heading up and down the river.  The building other side of the lock must have once been where the workers looked after the lock and had massive horse stables which is where the market is housed.  We both thought it was the best market we have ever visited.  We should have taken more photos!

Catherine and Amy Winehouse

Camden Lock

As a post script to this... we have been catching up on a lot of sleep since we arrived.  That is the good news.  The bad news is that after falling asleep at about 5pm yesterday we woke up at 3.20am this morning.  Hence having the mindset and energy to get this started :-)  Enjoy!