7/14/07 - Notting Hill

I want to go see Harry Potter again!!! But instead this Saturday in the company of my flatmate Megan we head on off to Notting Hill. Overcast and not to hot I pray it stays this nice. I hate being hot. We take the tube to Notting Hill Gate and follow the masses. And believe me there are masses upon masses of people. One big herding group of people.

The neighborhood is picturesque and funky all at the same time. Lots of little boutiques before we get to the beginning of the market, people walking in the street as cars try to make it by, in this one instance it seems the pedestrian does have the right of way. It’s kind of hard not to with all the massiveness as mentioned above.

We finally reach the “entranced” of Notting Hill, there is no sign telling you it’s the entrance but suddenly there are stalls and just hordes of people... so many it’s hard to walk without bumping into an elbow. It’s so crowded you have to fight for a spot just to look at the booths.

Megan and I decided we’d walk the whole length of the market and on the way back concentrate on looking, in other words we wanted to get away from the crowds. So we just glanced here in there. There were booths with purses and bags (lots of them), clothes, antiques (silverware, furniture) books (i so wanted to stop and look) then it suddenly turned into food. There where stalls of vegetable, breads, fruit, cheeses, etc... it all looked so wonderful. Finally we make it towards the end (4 blocks away) or what we decided was the end... it seemed to go on further. Towards our end there where stalls of clothing both vintage and new. And stalls of jewelry! Both vintage and new... i wanted everything! But restrained myself... I was only going to get some fruit today and leave the frivolous for another day :) We walked around a bit, Megan bought this beautiful neckless that had some crystal pieces with a portrait broach.. very London. We headed to the food section, picking out some apricots, bananas, green leaf lettuce and some yummy feta salad one of the stalls was selling. Further back up the stalls we stopped by some of the books and I picked up two books. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen (yeah) and Silas Marner by George Eliot. Both books are from an old printing but it doesn’t have printing date information or what edition it is, just that it was printed by T. Nelson and Sons, LTD (est. 1798). No pages are missing. I’ll have to find out when the books where published. But, I’m just happy I found a Jane Austen book.

Afterwards we where done.. our feet hurt and it was hot. We needed a place to sit and eat. We went up one of the side streets and found ourselves on Kensington Park Road and discovered a little Italian restaurant that made the most delicious pizza! Boy do I miss pizza! As it turned it they make stuff pizza. Then we waited a very long time for our bill. Which we notice is the norm here in London. It takes them a good 20 minutes for them to bring you your bill once they cleared off your table. I guess they want you to have time to just relax and let your food settle.. instead it just makes me antsy to be given all this time to settle. lol

We decided to take the bus part of the way back, to see more of this part of the city. The bus took us past Hyde Park on Kensington Road. We ended up going by cute little shops and pubs, Warner Music, a Whole Foods (yes, they have whole foods here), past the French Embassy, past Buckingham Palace Gardens and finally ended at Victoria Station, where we took the tube directly home. By the time we got home I was spent and ready for bed.

After that it was a pretty boring night. I had laundry to do (we have facilities on site) and while I did that I sat in the common rooms with my students living here and watched some TV. A nice easy evening compare to my crazy day.

Then Jeannia calls! Her flight has changed and she has a 7 hour layover in London!!! So she’ll be here tomorrow!!! Woohoo!!!

I’m planning to meet her at Paddington Station so we can hang out before she gets back on a plane on her way to Romania. Yeah! Tomorrow should be fun!