Of Hemispheres and Tea Leaves

Today was quite an adventure in itself. Teresa and I got up at 9AM, which is impressive for me on a weekend. We were joined with Rebecca, Shannon and Laura K. for our outing. We were running around in circles trying to find a working tube route to Westminster Pier (a good portion of the tube lines are down on the weekends for maintenance). We finally made it to the pier for the 10:40 boat to Greenwich. We had nice commentary on the boat ride, and saw a different view point of the London treasures. The weather was amazing; it was around 50 degrees, but it was sunny, light breeze and felt like 73 degrees.

At Greenwich, we were starving so we stopped at the first place we found - Desperado's, a Mexican/Italian/British food place. We prepared ourselves for disappointment based on what we've heard of flavored meals in England. We were actually very impressed - my penne with chicken in cream sauce was excellent. We had an appetizer of chips with salsa, guacamole and sour cream. We were in heaven.

After lunch, we managed to burn off the calories by trying to find the Royal Observatory. To get to it, we crossed through the beautiful park and trekked up Britain's answer to Heart Attack Hill. The Prime Meridian was somewhat impressive, and we topped off the trip by touching the world's oldest rock (4.5 billion years old).

We made a side-trip to the Queen's-House-Now-Turned-Museum, the only fact I found impressive about it was a scene in Sense & Sensibility was filmed in it. We managed to high-tail it back to the pier for the boat back to Westminster. Less commentary than before, but it did include banter against the Scots.

We did a roundabout again in the available tube lines to Kensington Park for high tea at the Orangery. We barely made it into the building before they closed. I ordered the orangery tea - a pot of Earl Gray, cucumber sandwiches, scone with jelly, and a slice of orange cake. Lovely.

We rode the tube home, and I scurried to three different grocery stores before finding mapel syrup for dinner (French toats and fruit). We just finished watching Shaun of the Dead (another zombie movie) while I typed this journal.

Monday we leave as a class for Stratford-On-Avon, we arrive back on Wednesday. The Friday after that, Teresa and I are off to Paris! We're quite a global duo. Cheers until then!