Day 23: Of Shopping and Shakespeare

Today was the day that we needed to move London accomodation, not because there was anything wrong with where we are at the beautiful Penthouse Limehouse Basin, but rather because the travel arrangements for the next couple of days required us to be closer to Paddington. So with heavy hearts we packed up and crammed into a smaller large cab and made the hour trek across London to the Mercure Paddington. Oh my! The contrast could not hav been more stark. While the hotel is ideally situated immediately adjacent to Paddington station, I do not think if you put our room and Martina and Enid's room together that they would even make the size of one master bedroom at Limehouse. This will take some adjustment!

Lunch was had at a local restaurant and then Chris discovered our room was ready and opted for a sleep while Martina, Enid and I caught the bus for some retail therapy at Primark and Evans. Not a lot to buy but it was really fun mooching around and it was a real education in how the other half live. Primark is a seething mass of humanity and the largest shopping population was stylishly dressed middle eastern women who were buying bag upon bag upon bag of clothes: 6 and 8 bags each.One woman in front of me in the queue had a bill of 2000 pounds!!! It just made me wonder why Primark and what the ultimate destination of the clothing would be. Shopping done, it was a convenient bus ride back to the hotel for a short rest, because tonight we were going to the Globe Theatre on the south Bank of the Thames in Southwark. We had chosen a dinner booking nice and early so that we were not late arriving for the play and so there was time for a short rest and we were back out on the Underground again. 

We were catching the Bakerloo line to Embankment and as we arrived on the platform/the train was in. Liz, Enid and Martina made it on but Chris was left stranded on the platform. Much lip reading ensued and the arrangement was to meet at Embankment. It was there that we faced another challenge when we transferred to the ferry wharf to discover that the cost of a ferry ride was an exorbitant 7 pounds and we did not have enough top up on left on our Oyster cards. We missed two ferries getting sorted and then had to go the long way round via Westminster London Eye, so it ended up being a mini cruise on the Thames with some great late afternoon photo opportunities. 

The Real Greek restaurant is literally on the riverside walk and affords some good views of the north bank of the Thames. We had opted for a pre theatre package where each diner could choose a bread/vegetable and dip combo, a salad or chips and a protein. And out it came, served on High Tea stands of all things and it was so utterly yum. There was actually a lot of food and we enjoyed sharing the different flavours. Then, over to the Globe for a mooch around in the gift shop before taking out seats in the middle gallery, just off centre for tonight’s performance of Twelfth Night. This is not a Shakespeare that I have seen performed before, although I did have to study it was back in the dark ages at uni. It was a bit confusing though, because there were women playing men, men playing women and men playing women pretend get to be men. Once we got our heads around who was who, the play was fabulous. It turns  out that this troupe of only 8 performers are the Touring Ensemble. They start their season at the Globe, they tour the world, and then they return to the Globe at the end of the season: and last night was the very first night back. Each of the actors is more than even a triple threat... a quadruple threat really: they act, dance, doing and each of them plays a musical instrument! Wow. It was such an enjoyable performance and was brought alive by the setting in the Globe, immediately adjacent to where the original one stood, south of the city, because the Puritans would not have any of that entertainment nonsense on the north bank in the City of London!! 

After the play we opted for a cab home rather than do battle wth the ferry and the stairs at the railway, so using Martina’s trusty app, we called a cab and were taken on a mini tour of London by night: across London Bridge, along the river and then later along the Strand, past Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square, Marble Arch and a whole lot of other places. What a cool way to finish our evening.