Day 4835

 

"Lounging" in Heathrow...

London (Days 4833-4835)

Day 4833

Our first full day in London begins with my yin and I taking consecutive walks around Knightsbridge, with her coming across random memorials:

and me taking a walk in Hyde Park and its more refined artistic expressions:

Prince Albert Memorial

Unlike our previous family trip to London in 2018 when we stayed in Notting Hill, and given our limited time in the city, we opted for something more central to maximize our time, and Knightsbridge provides a nice balance of being both laid back and centrally located, allowing us to maximize relaxation and minimize travel time. It is also quite posh:

But this is beside the point.

The point is that it was a swelteringly hot day in London, following a night of severe weather with an alleged 29,000 lightning strikes across southern England. Undaunted, we set out for Camden Town on the tube where we came across this lovely, and surprisingly moving, poem by a Polish poet:

“Letter” by Tadeusz Dabrowski

Upon arrival at our destination, we are greeted by sidewalks full of tourists:

and funky storefronts:

and picturesque passageways by the lock: 

where dozens (hundreds?) of vendors sell all manner of wares that generally remind me of St. Marks Place in New York circa 1997, albeit far more gentrified. As far as that goes, Camden also seems much more crowded and developed than it did when we briefly visited eight years ago, as evidenced by a tremendous multi-story food hall where we stop to get a chili paneer pizza, an improbable and absolutely delicious fusion dish from Bombay Pizza:

from their website, not our table

Bellies full, we stop for one quick pic:

and then head back south to wrap up our shopping excursion with new shoes for me:

from their website, not my feet

and a couple of new stuffies for sidecar at a very fancy department store:

Exhausted from the excursion and with temperatures pushing into the upper 90s, we get tired of waiting for the bus and decide to take a cab:

so we can make it home in time to rest before the day’s main event, a (mildly?) inappropriate musical:

at the Garrick Theatre:

which we enjoy immensely from the opening curtain to the closing bows:

Exhausted (and delighted) from the day, we take the tube back home and walk past an even fancier department store on the way back down Brompton Road:

While my yin and sidecar head straight for the apartment, I stop for a takeaway dosa at a nearby shop. My yin and I eat while sidecar readies herself for bed, and we tuck her in sometime after 11, snuggling with friends new and old:

Day 4834

The heat wave continued on our second full day, but undaunted by either the weather or my sore feat, I once again set out for my morning constitutional in Hyde Park, setting off in a different direction than the prior day. Preparations are being made for some sort of summer festival, which makes for a somewhat less attractive walk, but eventually I reach my destination, the somewhat underwhelming Marble Arch at the northeast corner of the park:

However, on the way back, I did come across a pretty cool statue of a baby wrestling a fish:

and a spiky blue flower in the rose garden:

and a Modigliani-esque sculpture of Pan chasing a family at the Edinburgh Gate:

The Rush on the Green

I returned to our apartment in time to meet one of my yin's innumerable yogi friends, but the day's heat was already causing transportation delays, forcing him to abort his journey from Heathrow to meet us (which was already remarkable to the point of incredulity given his red-eye back home to the UK). 

But this is beside the point.

The point is that the day's main event was a trip out to Watford, where we had mid-afternoon tickets for the Harry Potter studio tour:

This outing was one of those wonderful decisions owing to our general aversion to planning too much or too soon when we travel (trust, trust, trust - everything happens for a reason, in its own time, in its own way), and I'm honestly not even sure how we learned about it or whether it was in the Isle of Wight or after our arrival in London. Regardless, upon arrival...

Lumos Solem!

There are numerous images of our hours at this attraction, like my yin holding eyeballs:

and sidecar's (unintentional?) selfie in Foe Glass:

and an unexpected lessons in forced perspective:

and the actual Knight Bus:

and my (soon-to-be reverend) yin on the way out:

Suffice to say, it was an amazing day that reignited sidecar's love of Harry Potter and (one of) the most impressive self-conscious tourist attractions we have ever visited. 

Day 4835

Our final morning in London is largely undocumented, owing to a late morning flight back home (via NYC), but we did take the time to go up once more to the rooftop and take in the view once more:

Our ride to the airport ends up being an unexpected delight, with an Albanian driver who left home at 13 and has lived in London for nearly 30 years. In an odd coincidence, I tell him that Sam-I-Am has advised me to consider Albanian citizenship as a cost-effective alternative to (future) EU residency, and based upon our conversation en route to Heathrow, it seems like a capital idea if all of his countrymen are as friendly as him. 

Upon arriving at the airport, we arrive at Virgin's (amply documented) Upper Class drop-off, which I first experienced seven years ago when traveling for work. Upon entering the lounge, sidecar (reluctantly) agrees to a quick pic:

before we find a place to sit and wait for our time to board.

This adventure brought new challenges that may or may not ever see this venue, and addressing them brought more down time than previous international adventures, but with the slower pace emerged a return to this form, and for that I am grateful.

Day 4834

 

Learning about forced perspective at Warner Brothers studios outside London…

Day 4833

 

 Catching a (mildly inappropriate) show on West Emd…

Isle of Wight (Days 4827-4832)

Day 4827

Our adventures on the Isle of Wight begin with an imageless first day, owing to a poor night of sleep on the overnight flight from Boston to London and the inevitable jet lag that - despite splurging for an Uber from Heathrow direct to Southsea - left us all fairly miserable by the time we reached the terminal for the hovercraft. But if there were images of our departure from the mainland (assuming that one can call an island “the mainland”), they would be a less professional version of this one, pulled from the operator’s website: 

And while this is not beside the point, it is not the main point.

The main point is that we were greeted at the ferry station in Ryde by a former colleague turned friend, one of those wonderful instances where prolonged periods of stress allow something new to emerge that is far more valuable and durable than that which proceeded. For the purposes of these pages, I will refer to him as:

 After introducing him to my family, we loaded our things into his truck:

and drove the half hour to their home in Luccombe, a tiny hamlet nestled between approximately equidistant between Shanklin and Ventnor. The 900 year-old home was (allegedly) established as an abbey as part of the Norman conquest, with its grandeur subsequently enhanced through ownership by a financial manager of The Beatles and tenancy by Sam-I-Am:

Upon arrival and after briefly introducing our families, sidecar immediately retired to the upstairs bedroom and crashed out for the remainder of the evening while my yin and I visited with Sam-I-Am, his wonderful pagan wife, and two half-feral children, the older of whom was celebrating his 10th birthday. Remarkably, we retained consciousness until 8pm before crashing out for the night.

Day 4828

Our first full day begins a bit slowly, with a forced smile from a stylish sidecar:

 marking our departure for lunch at a lovely oceanfront restaurant:

where my yin and the pagan struck a pose:

before we all walked down to the shore to take a selfie, courtesy of Sam-I-Am’s freakishly long arms:

After packing back into the truck, we made a quick stop at a grocery store to pick up a few essentials and then returned home where we chilled out until dinner, a delicious meal consisting of pasta, sweet potatoes, salad, and good conversation. As an added bonus, I was also able to surreptitiously snap a photo of sidecar 

reading while looking out the kitchen window.

Day 4829

Friday marks the day when our families paths diverged, with Sam-I-Am loading up the truck for their adventure to the Outer Hebrides, which was graciously delayed by a couple of days on our behalf and which I can only assume was timed to coincide with the coming summer solstice. After saying our goodbyes, we wait for sidecar to wake, and per usual, she begins her day with reading:

while my yin dozed in the late morning sun:

Eventually we get ourselves moving, however, and thanks to the kindness of Sam-I-Am, we have use of the beater truck:

that they had recently taken to North Africa, where they endured all sorts of (mis)adventures that would have caused less sturdy (and more reasonable) families to swear off travel altogether. 

But this is beside the point.

The point is that the truck not only had the steering wheel on the right hand side of the vehicle, but also had a manual transmission, which meant not only would I have to drive on the wrong side of the road, but also using my left hand:

Undeterred by the fact that it had been more than two decades since I last drove a stick shift (and grateful for a very forgiving clutch), we ventured to the western end of the island, admiring the incredible views through the windshield that was still stained with Moroccan mud and dead bugs:

and remembering to stay on the left of approaching cars:

and admiring the chalk cliffs of the aptly named Alum Bay

and the cows that graze in its pastures:

before eventually arriving at Lord Tennyson’s Monument:

and then hiking the (longer than expected) path to the Needles:

 

which were less imposing than any of us had imagined.

By this point, sidecar’s energies were flagging so my yin and I decided to split up so that she could walk down to the tourist area and find food and water while I ventured back to the vehicle along the crest of the ridge:

After reconvening at the tourist area, we drove back via the center of the island and made a brief stop for additional groceries before coming home to relax and unwind for the rest of the evening.

Day 4830

Saturday begins with a misty morning and thick fog. In no hurry to start the day, we have another relaxed morning before heading out for Ventnor via the public footpath, of which there are hundreds of miles across the island:

until we see the town begin to take shape below us:

and cross into Bonchurch hand-in-hand:

When we reach Ventnor, we are immediately greeted by graffiti:

and the whole town has a funky vibe that belies its Victorian roots, ranging from the dog we met in a New Age-y gift shop:

to the lush fauna adorning the curved roads beneath the Art Deco community center:

to the funky socks in the record store:

in a seaside town: 

that reminds us of colder, cloudier version of Albufeira from our trip to Portugal several years ago:

By late afternoon we have seen the entire town, and we begin walking back home. The sun has finally returned, and we opt for the sidewalk along the coast road rather than enduring the shadeless fields above the road. Along the way, we encounter the following PSA:

Eventually we reach the field below the house, and sidecar and I walk in waist-high grasses:

before finally crashing out:

Day 4831

Our last full day on the Isle of Wight is a sunny affair, spent doing some packing and conserving energy for our evening outing:

My intrepid yin, however, decides to venture into Shanklin to take in the seaside town:

dip her toes in the frigid water:

admire this theatre built in the late 19th century:

and presumably cower upon encountering this creepy stuffed animal:

Upon her return, we spent a few hours resting and preparing for our departure for the London the following day before heading out to the festival to see The Kooks and The Cure. We drive into town and luck out by finding the last available spot in Coppins Bridge car park, which allows us to stay out of the traffic diversions and road closures associated with the festival. We walk 15 minutes: 

to the festival grounds at Seaclose Park and arrive to the standard music festival array of food vendors and sprawling crowds, albeit with more families and quite a bit less drunkenness than most US festivals. There is a ferris wheel:

and a spinning contraption that seems completely absurd given the warm day and abundance of fried foods:

After settling into a relatively quiet spot well back from the stage, sidecar (per usual) pulls out a book and begins to read:

Ambitiously, she decided to bring this one:

and at various points over the next hour, she asks for additional explanations of the differences between Platonic ideas about absolute space compared to Galileo and Newton’s relativistic understanding. I muddle my way through as best I can (my cosmology is a bit rusty) while the Kooks play:

and once the sun gets low enough and the magical hour arrives, a woman behind us offers to take a family portrait:

as the main act takes the stage:

As Robert Smith - now 69 years-old - sings, his voice is indistinguishable from how it sounded 30+ years ago when I first discovered the band, or even 50 years ago when the band formed. I tell sidecar how much I would have liked to have experienced this when I was her age, to which she responded:

Eventually dusk arrives:

and the crowds thin out slightly, and with sidecar’s energy waning, we listen to one final song before heading back to our car:

that brings me back to 1999 and a sad, yet beautiful relationship that ended that summer, a mixtape soundtrack that included this very song. 
 

Day 4832

Our final morning on the Isle of Wight is spent largely cleaning up the house, finishing up our packing, and saying goodbye to the neighbor Margaret:

Our taxi picks up promptly at 11:45, and we chat with the friendly driver who also loves punny jokes on the half hour ride to Ryde, where we head back to the mainland after an hour-long delay, owing to the throngs of festival-goers who are leaving the island.

The train from Portsmouth back to London is a subdued affair:

and upon arrival at Waterloo Station:

we make our way to Knightbridge via the tube, with sidecar foreshadowing a (possible) future (gap year) adventure...