Whipped Cream, a Cherry on Top and a Statue

We did a short visit to London, I hadn’t been in for about 2 years due to covid.

Even in rain London is always magnificent.

We passed Trafalgar Square to see what is on the 4th plinth. Every so often there is a new sculpture on it.

I loved the this one, whipped cream and a cherry on top – with a fly and a drone which transmits a life feed of Trafalgar Square – here.

Heather Phillipson’s vast physical and digital sculpture tops the Fourth Plinth with a giant swirl of whipped cream, a cherry, a fly and a drone that transmits a live feed of Trafalgar Square. Entitled THE END it suggests both exuberance and unease, responding to Trafalgar Square as a site of celebration and protest, that is shared with other forms of life. The live feed of Trafalgar Square picked up by the drone’s camera is visible on a dedicated website www.theend.today giving a sculpture’s eye perspective. 

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I met Gene Kelly, one of my Tap heroes, in Leicester Square.

Dancing in the Rain.

… and of course I danced with him – what a privilege.

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We walked to the station via Soho with the ever present Chinese cooking smells, I love.

We enjoyed it thoroughly.

Relaxing was on the agenda!

I was

in desperate need of

a full body massage

4 days of sleep

and a trip to the Bahamas….

I didn’t make the Bahamas,

but a lovely hotel in London.

It had a pool/ Spa to relax, a wonderfully big room,

welcoming fruit and a great Breakfast on the 10th floor

with great view to finish with.

On the way home we saw some lovely colour splashes on a grey day.

Sometimes you just need to get out

have a rest and pamper yourself.

It is well worth it and

gives you more energy for the week ahead.

 

Hope you all had a relaxing weekend,

for a fresh start into the new week!

Much love from a chilled me 🙂

♥♥♥

Two Steps from Hell Concert in Europe

As you know I am a huge fan of Two Steps From Hell

They finally do a Europe Tour next year, hurray!

They are coming to London on 22nd April 2020.

Pure Epic-ness !

 

I can’t wait, it’ll be such a treat to see them live.

 

Check out the Website if you are interested or

their facebook page.

 

Some of my previous posts about TSfH

 

March 2013 link

June 2013 link 

October 2013 link

June 2014 link

Lights in London

A short visit in cold wintry christmassy London was lovely , specially with all lights everywhere.

See for yourself!

 

Snow… yay…..gone

Newsflash:

Many of other countries and cities have snow regularly in Winter.

London, UK doesn’t.

BUT:

Yesterday it rained really heavily,

then I couldn’t hear it any more,

looked out

and

it snowed. 

Snow in London!

How exciting.

A little bit stayed on the car roofs.

The children in school were so excited , some of them had never seen snow before.

One child came to the first aide saying he got a snowflake in his mouth. Bless him.

Well, by the time I wanted to take a picture it was all gone.

I said it was a news FLASH, 🙂

gone in a flash….

… so we just look at the lovely snow pictures again.

Keep warm!

 

Home Tweet Home

Very close to the former Olympic Village which is now called East Village,

there are some lovely parks and many green spaces.

This is 15 minutes from my home away.

On my walk I found this today:

East Village and the RSPB ( Royal Society for the protection of birds)

have joined up with local carpenter Pete Bagg

to create 10 London skyline inspired bird boxes

to help bring birds back to the capital.

 

 

Wonderfully done.

I have a picture of the original London Landmark

combined with the bird box.

See for yourself.

BT Tower

BT Tower

 

Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace

Olympic Velodrome

Olympic Velodrome

Battersea Power station

Battersea Power station

Olympic Orbit

Olympic Orbit

Big Ben

Big Ben

Canary Wharf – HSBC Building

Canary Wharf HSBC Building

Tower Bridge

Tower Bridge

The Tower of London

London Tower

The Gherkin

Gherkin

What a fantastic idea.

The boxes are displayed for one month here

before each box is moved to its permanent home

at green locations around the area.

Let the birds come…..

 

More gardens in London

I discovered another lovely green space in London.

A little oasis right in the middle

of the concrete jungle of the Barbican.

There is the second biggest conservatory in London

which is like a mini Kew Gardens with exotic plants,

like cacti, orchids, bamboo etc.

It is home to exotic fish and over 2,000 species of tropical plants.

It is open on Sundays to the public for free.

See for yourself what we found there:

 

 

 

 

 

A perfect way to spend a Sunday afternoon in London.

 

 

 

 

 

IL DIVO night

I was fortunate to get tickets for an Il Divo concert in the London O2 Arena yesterday.

 

Il Divo are 4 young men with amazing voices, they have been created 12 years ago and go from strength to strength.  I have followed them for at least 9 years now. They do sing pop opera or as it is called popera.

 

They are David Miller ( American) Tenor, Sebastian Izambard (French) Tenor, Urs Buehler (Swiss) Tenor and Carlos Marin (Spanish) Bariton.

 

I got tickets for their tour called Amor et pasion which goes up to November and they are visiting all different cities all over the world.

 

 

In this tour they added solos, dancing and playing instruments themselves to their amazing singing.

 

They also added dancers to some of their latin american songs.

 

It was a feast for ears and eyes.

 

There were 7000 people there and we didn’t want to let Il Divo go home, demanding more songs which they gave us. ❤

 

 

 

It was a totally enjoyable and amazing evening and I can only recommend that if they are near you, go and see them.

 

This was after the final good bye song!

 

 

Here a beautiful track.

 

 

 

Still smiling?

Good Morning my friends.

It has been a while

since I had enough time to sit and compose something

and visit all your blogs regularly.

Even though holidays I have been away and had visitors,

which I thoroughly enjoyed.

 

Finding new places in London to show my visitors I stumbled on some

yet fairly unknown places.

One of them is Crossrail place.

This is a new development, not even finished,

but the beautiful roof garden is finished.

It looks rather futuristic.

 

It features plants from East and West, meeting in the middle. A calm garden on top of a new railway station which is being build in Canary Wharf. It was calm and quiet in the middle of a concrete world. We had a lovely walk and enjoyed the amazing plants and trees there. Have a look for yourself!

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There was a piano in the middle of the building so I couldn’t resist to do a fun bit on it which my aunt taught me.

 

It was great fun and a great place to visit!

More discoveries in the next post!

Keep smiling and enjoy the warmer weather!

Treasure Hunt in London

We’ve been invited to take part on a treasure hunt

from work as a fun activity on Friday evening.

I joined and we met at Liverpool Street Station.

The hunt was around Shoreditch, a trendy place now.

London keeps changing constantly.

When I came to London this was not a place to be … now it is!

It was amazing and  I learnt more about my London.

 

Here are 2 facts:

 

Beigel Bake , a place which bakes bagels 24 hours a day

in the traditional  Jewish style with different fillings.

They apparently sell 7000 bagels a day!

Wow – Well it was busy when we passed it.

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We found underground trains on top of an old bridge

which was knocked down as the railway lines were changed.

 

 

We found many trendy places to eat or hang out, all packed on a Friday night.

We had a fun evening and I will explore more in that area soon.

 

I love London!