Other London Exploits

So, I mentioned that I had been to the Wallace Collection, the Museum of Childhood and Regent's Park in an earlier post. I won't bore you with too many details but I thought I'd share some of my finds.

The Wallace Collection is a really good place to go if you want to see some fantastic 15th to 19th Century examples of artwork, furniture, porcelain, etc. It is best known for the collection of 18th Century French works. Their armoury is pretty darn cool too, just so you know. I'd highly recommend a visit, and it's free so why wouldn't you? The collection was built up by the four Marquesses of Hertford, most of it gathered by the 4th Marquess Richard Seymour-Conway, who then left the collection to his son, Sir Richard Wallace. Sir Richard's widow, Lady Wallace, is responsible for establishing the museum, since she left the whole darn lot to the nation on condition that no item ever leave the collection. Quite nice of her I would say, and a fair deal for the nation.

I headed from the Wallace Collection over to the Museum of Childhood at Bethnal Green. Now this place also houses a few treasures, mostly sentimental value, since I recognised some stuff from when I was a kid. And I'm fairly certain my parents recognised objects that they'd had as kids as well when I showed them the photos. You have to deal with lots of children (it is a Museum of Childhood afterall) but if you can cope with that then I would go here too, it's kind of fun to regress for a little while and reminisce about toys and stuff. Also, there are some incredible examples of clothes and childhood items from other eras too, not just toys.

Regent's Park was my last afternoon in London before I started a tour round Europe. I'd been told that it was a nice place for a wander so I headed there after I got bored with the Camden Markets. It's a beautiful garden, lots of lovely roses. I think I was probably there for about two hours, not quite sure.

The weather was gorgeous, so sunny that I ended up taking my cardigan off, and just enough of a breeze that I didn't feel like I was burning in the sun. Took a few photos of the roses since there were so many, and wandered through most of the park. Turns out there was also a concert at the open air stage, which, although I didn't go to the concert I could hear the music of from quite a distance. Made a lovely accompaniment to my stroll in the park.

Disclaimer: All photos taken by me.

A jaunt to the West End via Bar NightJar

One of my aims while I was in London was to go see a show of some sort on the West End. Who wouldn't want to do that?! I managed to convince myself that it was worth it to line up and try to get a lottery ticket to see 'Much Ado About Nothing' starring David Tennant and Catherine Tate.

I'm a bit of a Doctor Who fan so I've seen them in the TV show together and thought it might be nice to see them in a live stage show. Also, I've never seen Much Ado live before so I was attempting to kill two birds with one stone if you will. When I asked my hotel concierge if it was possible to still get tickets to Much Ado (which was in its closing week) I thought I had buckley's chance, but he informed me of the lottery. Apparently if you turn up to Wyndham's Theatre sometime between 10 and 10:30am they'd give you a raffle ticket and then at 10:30 they'd draw 20 of them and the people with those tickets are able to buy some of the best seats in the house for just £10. I decided that I might as well go along and see how it went, nothing ventured nothing gained and all that.

I would like to be able to say that I'd managed to get a winning ticket. Unfortunately that wasn't the case, I was one number off! :-( But, then I lined up to buy a returns ticket - one which someone had bought at full price and had to return for some reason. It wasn't cheap but it still wasn't full price, so I ended up getting one for the performance that night.

Decided to make a decent night of it and head to a bar that a friend had recommended before seeing the show. Had to catch the Piccadilly Line to King's Cross St. Pancras station and then switch to the Northern Line to get to Old Street station, and it took me a little longer than I was expecting to find the place, but once I got there it was one of the best bars I've ever been too. I've been noted by a friend as someone who it's hard to make a drink for, as according to him I'm a bit of a "fussy one" - his words, not mine (you can read them here on his blog in a post about Motel Bar, an amazing place in Wellington).
If you believe the whole fussy drinker thing then it might surprise you to hear that this place in London managed to make me two incredible drinks in a very short half hour time period.

Where was I? At a place called Bar Nightjar on City Road. (Go check out their website)
Service at Nightjar was brilliant. I walked in, without a booking and was immediately greeted by a hostess who was quite happy to sit me at the bar. Admittedly, it was quite early in the evening on a Wednesday night for it to be too much of a problem, but having mentioned that someone I knew had been raving about the place she actually knew who I was talking about right away once I said where I'm from, which I found quite surprising since my friend has only ever been there once!



The bartender was great. He let me peruse the menu for a little while, then talked to me about what sort of drinks I normally like and made a couple of recommendations. I ended up going with a Scoff Law and a 24 Volt Cobbler. The Scoff Law was at the recommendation of the bartender, something which I'd been eyeing off in the menu but couldn't decide if I would drink or not. I'm glad I took him up on the suggestion, it was a very enjoyable drink and I only wish that I'd had some more time to savour it. I probably could have drunk it a little slower, but the 24 Volt Cobbler had caught my eye before the Scoff Law, and I just had to try it.

Here's why:

24 Volt Cobbler - side view



Mozart dry chocolate eau de vie

Fresh cranberries

Maple syrup

Fresh squeezed lime

Nightjar electric bitters

Mixed berries liqueur

Red wine

(all credit to Nightjar's website menu)



24 Volt Cobbler - top view



Firstly, who wouldn't want to try something called Electric Bitters? But, aside from that, it sounded delicious to me before I even saw it. And then I was presented with the cocktail itself. Absolutely incredible! That's all I've got to say. I'm not one for reviewing a drink so I've not got the appropriate repertoire of words to describe what I was tasting, and I didn't really make any notes about it's flavours, but wow! Probably one of the best drinks I've ever had in my life, that's really all I need to say I think. I would go back to Nightjar in a heartbeat if I'm in London again. It's unfortunate that I couldn't spend the evening there. I should've gone earlier in my trip when I could actually take the time to enjoy the drinks as they should be enjoyed, but that's life.



David Tennant



Had to make my way back to Wyndham's Theatre very quickly, since Much Ado was due to start at 7:30pm. I took my seat, which turned out to be quite a nice one. Royal Circle B15, pretty much smack bang in the middle of the second row on the first floor. Had a brilliant view of the stage so I didn't miss anything, which was good because it was a great show. There was some tension in the audience to start, since David Tennant had been sick for the last two performances and not been on stage, but the curtain lifted and the play started straight off without any announcement of the sort, so it was no surprise to me when he appeared on stage. He did get a massive round of applause though, since we were all pretty stoked to see that he was in it.



Catherine Tate



It was a brilliant show! Moments I don't think I'll forget include seeing David Tennant in a denim mini-skirt and Catherine Tate dangling in mid-air and flailing about. And I ended up getting some autographs and photographs out of it all, so I'd say my trip to the West End was a success if you ask me.

Disclaimer: All photo's taken by myself; 24 Volt Cobbler recipe from Bar Nightjar - please see their website

European Reflections

So, as I mentioned in my first post this blog is going to be a mixture of many things. I thought I might start with some reflections of a recent trip to Europe.
First thing to note is that I really don't sleep much on planes. I learnt this lesson a long time ago but it was reinforced this trip. By the time I got back to Australia I'd seen 14 movies, 7 on the way over and 7 on the way back. A plane trip provides me with an excuse for a movie marathon it seems, since there's not really much else to do. Also, they feed you a tonne of food on Emirates flights. Not that I'm complaining, but wow!

Stained glass ceiling in Harrods Foodhall 

Anyway, London was my first port of call. It's an amazing city, I've been before but this time I could explore some other stuff. Ended up meeting some 'locals' while in the Victoria & Albert museum who showed me around Harrods and Hyde Park. Did you know that Harrods has a Pet Kingdom? I did not. They have the cutest Bengal Kittens (or they did while I was there)! Well we explored Harrods for a while and then decided to grab some food from the Foodhall to eat in Hyde Park. The Foodhall of Harrods is fantastic. There's some brilliant stained glass and blown glass lights, and it smells delicious down there. I ended up buying some elderflower bubbly, to try something new, and some kind of bacon and cheese bread twist. I can attest to the fact that their bakery goods not only smell wonderful but taste it too!

It's kind of fun to meet nice randoms in new cities and have them show you around, I quite enjoyed it as it meant I wasn't all alone on my first day in London. Did I forget to mention that this was the afternoon I'd landed in London that I did this? I thought it would be a good way to stay awake if I ventured out of my hotel to explore a museum, and bumping into Jen and Vi with the help of a lovely German/American woman on my tour of the museum was an even better way, since it at least meant I got to see a few places and didn't go back to my hotel until after 7pm.

Outside British Museum

Managed to find my way back to the British Museum the next day, because what's a trip to London without stopping there? Was slightly disappointed to find that one of the rotating exhibits was "Australian Season", full of paintings and sketches by Australian artists like Sidney Nolan. I've seen enough of those in Australia, I was going overseas to see new stuff! I guess I can look at the positive side of it though, it meant there was less I had to rush about to see :-)
Amusingly enough I bumped into the German/American woman and her family again, after also having seen them in Harrods the previous evening. Had a lovely chat once again, very amused by the whole thing. But I guess if you're tourists in London there's a few set places you're likely to go, so it's not so surprising that I kept bumping into Bridgit and Stephanie (her daughter).

Foyer of the British Museum

I mastered the Tube/Underground, whatever you like to call it. I was expecting it to be terrible but it was mostly on time and not too bad. Crowded at times, but that's to be expected on any form of public transport, not just London's.
Other London exploits included a jaunt to the West End for a show via Bar NightJar (an amazing place!), a visit to Regent's Park and some time at the Wallace Collection and the Museum of Childhood - more to come on these!

Disclaimer: All photos posted were taken by me.

A new venture!

Welcome to Melissa's Gallimaufry!

My name, if you haven't worked it out, is Melissa. I'm a 20-something professional living in Australia and I've decided to join the growing crowd of people who post things online.

This blog is intended to be a random mix of my general thoughts and ideas, as well as some of the things I stumble across on the interwebs which I think are interesting, hence gallimaufry! It's a cool word, isn't it? I've found various definitions for it, my favourites being:

1. A confused jumble or medley of things.
2. A hodgepodge, jumble; mixture of diverse things.

So, I hope you enjoy the random ramblings to come!