London: day twenty-six

With Hannah gone away to Bath, Abi off gallivanting around Denmark, and Tula spending the day with a visiting friend, I was posed with the dilemma of having a sunny day and no idea what to do. I knew there were some things that would undoubtedly be more interesting with other people, so wanting to save those I eventually decided to spend the day hopping around London looking for artwork by Banksy. I wrote down the addresses from online, and then set off, first taking the Tube to Warren Station. After consulting a map and figuring out my direction, I set off down a quiet side-street. Right when I was beginning to question whether or not I was going the right way, and considering turning around, I went around one last corner which turned out, luckily, to have the art in question. This work had been preserved behind a sort of Plexiglas covering and said, “If graffiti changed anything, it would be illegal.” A little rat sat in the bottom right corner, looking over his shoulder with paws covered in red paint. I snapped a few pictures and returned to the Tube station which I then took to Green Park.

At Green Park, I did the same thing, got my bearings and then set off down a side-street. This neighborhood was exceptionally ritzy – which, considering that it was immediately next to the Ritz, I suppose it makes sense… What especially caught my eye were the high-end car dealerships which lined the street; Rolls Royce, Audi, Bentley, and Jaguar all next door to one another. Admittedly, I had to stop for a moment and drool over a black Bugatti. I smiled a bit at the perfect contrast that Banksy’s art created, set high up on one of the buildings in a back alley, it was the image of a woman falling with a shopping cart, the contents spilling out.

At this point, I just decided to explore, and followed the road along Green Park, past the Hard Rock Café (the original), and past the art vendors until I reached Hyde Park Corner. From here I was back in familiar territory. However, I intentionally turned away from Hyde Park and followed one of the roads I had not been down before. I was aware that I was paralleling Hyde Park and that I would eventually come to the Victoria and Albert Museum from the opposite direction as I always had before. Along this road, though is Harrod’s. 

Harrod’s is an upmarket store that has quite the reputation; they claim that you can buy anything there, and if they don’t have it, they’ll find it. To give you an idea, in the past, people have bought pet lions there. Though the pet section has since been shut down, not much has been lost. I’m pretty sure that my eyebrows were raised the entire time I was in there. Every corner I rounded I was met with products by the biggest name brands. And everything was so far out of my price range that I dared not touch a thing, even trying hard not to brush up against any of the clothes on the rack. The store is endless, and literally has everything, all in the highest quality. I did not get through the whole place but I did get to see a decent amount before heading back out onto the street. I followed the road down past the Victoria and Albert Museum before boarding the Tube at South Kensington and riding it back to King’s Cross. Before going back to NIDO I made a pit stop at Tesco for some groceries, and then went back and uploaded the photos I had taken on my tour.

A little later Tula texted me and invited me to meet her and her friend near Oxford Circus. However, as I was taking the Tube and they were on the bus, we ended up in quite different places and it turned out that Oxford Circus was not the right Tube stop, so I went over to Tottenham, but by the time I’d gotten there Tula and her friend had moved elsewhere and I was having a hard time getting there. Starting to get really cold from walking around in the blasting wind, I decided to call it a bust (luckily too because as it turned out, they ended up not being in the place they thought they were in, so who knows how long it would have taken to find one another). However, I did enjoy the little excursion and discovered that there is a Ripley’s Believe it or Not Museum here – thinking I may have to check that out at some point – so some good came from it.

I took the Tube back to Euston Square, intending to go to Preismart which I believed was on Gower Street. However, I walked and walked and walked some more until Gower turned into Bloomsburry. Apparently Preismart is not where I thought it was, so I’ll have to peek at a map and try again later. Along the way though, something in my knee started twinging and became quite painful, so instead of walking back, I took the bus. As I stood at the bus stop, I looked about, and as it would turn out, I was back near Tottenham Station – I had walked all the way back there! No wonder I was starting to get sore. So it was quite a relief when I could finally sit down and relax back here at NIDO.