Birthdays and beers!

We have had a great birthday weekend here in London Town. We booked for the Tower of London on the Friday and got there (fairly) early at 10.30am to avoid the worst of the school holiday crowds. After spending a good couple of hours enjoying one of London’s biggest tourist attractions, we headed down to Portobello Markets for some browsing and some lunch. That night we made for Angel to meet up with J, Bec, Nathan and Ryan at the Camden Head for some celebratory drinks, continuing on at the local Walkie until we had to run to catch the last tube home.
Saturday we decided to pay a visit to London's big new Westfields. We picked up some great bargains, although were a little disappointed that a certain Portuguese chicken place was not among the numerous food options! (The Boost juice really hit the spot though!) Sunday we hit O'Neills for some lunch, before embarking on a (unsuccessful) mission to Brick Lane in search of some of those cheapo DVD's.
In other news, unfortunately living at the pub at Angel just didn’t stick, so we are now down here at Clapham South in a share house, living with 3 others. A little hard to get used to at first, but it’s working out OK and Clapham is a lovely area. We are here until we go away, so for about the next 7 weeks.
Will update again after our trip out to the Cotswolds on Sunday (fingers crossed for a nice day!) We have also entered the ballot for a 20/20 county cricket match at Lords (seeing we won’t make it to the Ashes after all) to be played the day after we return from Norway, and we should find out shortly if we have been successful.
Hope everyone is well.

Some random on the dance floor

Weber siblings

Portobello markets

At the Tower of London

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Well, as you may have been reading about in the news, London has been hit by its biggest snowfall in 19 years, making for some great fun as we were able to make snowmen, have snowball fights and generally have a blast! The Monday snow dump capped off an eventful weekend in London Town, so here is an update on what’s been happening.
We had tickets to a Premier League game on Saturday at Fulham’s home ground, Craven Cottage. After a quick pint en route at the Slug and another outside the stands (not allowed to drink while watching the English football – seems quite unnatural really) we took our seats behind the goal. Fulham ended up winning an entertaining game 3-1 (although we left before the final whistle to avoid the crowds – I would guess about 24,000). On the way home we stopped for some dinner and a…ahem… few drinks at the Slug (great Aussie bar that it’s hard to believe we haven’t been to before this). Then, seeing as it was our final night down at Earl’s Court, we decided to say farewell to SW5 with a drink at our local O’Neills, a semi regular haunt in our time in south west London.
Sunday was our official moving day, although Dave had been moving our stuff gradually over the past couple of weeks, so most of it was already done. Sunday morning was spent cleaning the flat, before our landlord’s representative had a brief inspection and saw us on our way. Sunday night, to our delight, it began to snow…
The next morning we woke to a world of white. With the news that all buses were suspended, I grumpily hopped on the tube the two stops to work. After lasting out the morning and looking longingly out at the snow, at midday we were told we could leave!! As half our office couldn’t make it in it seemed pretty pointless being there anyway. I arrived home and went out to lunch, after which Dave and I helped make a snowman!! (Some pelting of Dave with snowballs also occurred at this point.) The snow eased up by evening (but the pub still shut early!) and it is not snowing now, although more is forecast for later in the week so we’ll see what happens. Some pics below.
Before I wrap, a brief update on our plans for the remainder of our time abroad. I finish up at work on April 10th, and on April 20th, accompanied by Giedre, we fly to Riga, travelling by train from there on to Moscow!! We will spend 6 days in Mother Russia before looping around some of the rest of Eastern Europe, stopping in Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic (we have a reservation at Gordon Ramsey in Prague!!), Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, and Bosnia and Hercegovina, before heading up to Norway to see Bergen and the fjords. On our return we will spend a leisurely week in London with my parents. Our flight to Australia departs Heathrow on 8th June, touching down in Sydney on the 10th, bringing to a close the past 20 months.
So that’s it for now. We are planning our birthday weekend (long weekend – mine falls on a Friday this year and we are both taking the day off!) We will be staying around London, sightseeing and catching up with people, including my little brother, who is making the big move to London this month!
Hope everyone is well xo