After our weekend on the Yorkshire Coast, we both had to work New Years Eve although to be honest I was working from home so it wasn't too taxing, but Donna was on her feet all day running around John Lewis sorting out customer complaints, dealing with customer queries, so she had a much harder end to 2018 than I had.
So as we often do now, we had a steady New Years Eve at home, a hot drink and some nibbles tucked up warm in bed with plans for New Years Day. And we had a fairly full on day planned.
We left the house at 7:45am heading over to Retford to get the LNER 1st Class train down to London; arriving at 10am. The main attraction of heading down to the capital today was for the New Year Parade, now in it's 33rd year, over 8,000 performers and also viewed across the world. Starting at mid-day with a 2 mile route through part of the capital.
After taking the tube down to Piccadily Circus we had a walk around then stopped off for a hot drink before finding a space on the parade route, just north of Trafalgar Square. A decent spot, the best ones were already taken but we did well to get close to a corner and right up against the barrier so great for photos. And it was great, lots of marching bands from the USA in particular but some from other countries, many other types of performers from over 20 countries. A delightful 'fest' of sight and sound.
After a couple of hours we were I must admit starting to get a little stiff stood there with no room to move, so we left the parade and walked 15 minutes up to Soho to dine at Tommi's Burger Joint - one we know well from frequenting it a number of times before in Reykjavik. And yes it was just (ok almost) as nice.
Shortly after eating we headed across London to the Natural History Museum - a stunning building both in and out. We spent a couple of hours there but to be honest it was very busy in there which is not really our thing (yes we are in London), and it was too warm. Even after stripping down to single layers we gave up and headed out into the cold evening air.
Back onto the underground over to the Embankment then an hour strolling along the Thames before getting the tube back up to Kings Cross. A refreshing drink in the Premier Inn on Euston Road then into the station to jump on the 8:30pm train to head back north. It had seemed that it would be as quiet and relaxing as the journey down, until the staff announced that they had a missing standard carriage so stuffed our 1st class carriage with people that had been left with nowhere to sit. A little frustrating, but hey, not the end of the world.
So as we often do now, we had a steady New Years Eve at home, a hot drink and some nibbles tucked up warm in bed with plans for New Years Day. And we had a fairly full on day planned.
We left the house at 7:45am heading over to Retford to get the LNER 1st Class train down to London; arriving at 10am. The main attraction of heading down to the capital today was for the New Year Parade, now in it's 33rd year, over 8,000 performers and also viewed across the world. Starting at mid-day with a 2 mile route through part of the capital.
After taking the tube down to Piccadily Circus we had a walk around then stopped off for a hot drink before finding a space on the parade route, just north of Trafalgar Square. A decent spot, the best ones were already taken but we did well to get close to a corner and right up against the barrier so great for photos. And it was great, lots of marching bands from the USA in particular but some from other countries, many other types of performers from over 20 countries. A delightful 'fest' of sight and sound.
After a couple of hours we were I must admit starting to get a little stiff stood there with no room to move, so we left the parade and walked 15 minutes up to Soho to dine at Tommi's Burger Joint - one we know well from frequenting it a number of times before in Reykjavik. And yes it was just (ok almost) as nice.
Shortly after eating we headed across London to the Natural History Museum - a stunning building both in and out. We spent a couple of hours there but to be honest it was very busy in there which is not really our thing (yes we are in London), and it was too warm. Even after stripping down to single layers we gave up and headed out into the cold evening air.
Back onto the underground over to the Embankment then an hour strolling along the Thames before getting the tube back up to Kings Cross. A refreshing drink in the Premier Inn on Euston Road then into the station to jump on the 8:30pm train to head back north. It had seemed that it would be as quiet and relaxing as the journey down, until the staff announced that they had a missing standard carriage so stuffed our 1st class carriage with people that had been left with nowhere to sit. A little frustrating, but hey, not the end of the world.
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