London is an awesome place, but I could never live there. As someone who spends her whole life being late, or in a hurry, or stressed because I have forgotten something, I know how much it sucks to be on the go 24/7. And yet people in London seem to have that times 10. Everything seems to run in a way that makes these little stresses so much more likely to occur. Trains get delayed, there is always traffic, everywhere is busy, people are rude. As a tourist, London is beautiful. But man if I had to live there every day I'd be arrested for assault (at minimum) in no time at all.
So the trip was originally planned as a surprise for my mums birthday, but due to some unforeseen family circumstances it had to be delayed. Better late than never, nearly a whole month after her birthday we made it into London, with a plan to see as much as possible before the main aim of the trip: to take my mummy to see Les Miserables for the first time in ten years. As a little background for you, my mum has been saying how much she would love to get back to see the show for as long as I can remember, but has never been one for spending money on herself. This year with my first sign of financial stability, I decided it was time to set that right.
We started the day pretty chill in our pj's, working out which tube stations we needed for each attraction, whether it was easier to drive or train there, and where we wanted to go. We "popped in" to the local shops to run a few errands for my looming trip to Barcelona because, as per usual with me, I had left everything to the last minute. That ended up taking a lot more time than we originally planned, and we ended up rushing to a local restaurant for a budget lunch before hitting the city. We sped down to the train station in my little yellow bumble bee car and had to run across the bridge to make it for the train, with me puffing on my inhaler the whole way. We made it by minutes, just ordering all our complicated tickets in time, and headed to the main station in our area. We changed over in Reading, and had to run the through the old station, sprint to the nearest guard to ask which platform we needed, then run all the way through the new part of the station, right down to the platform just to miss our train by about 30 seconds.
After watching our train pull away without us, we had some time to stand on the platform and catch our breath (which for me sounds like much like a seal dying, slowly). We did end up getting on a rather swish train in the end though so it worked out for the best. Before we knew it we were in London, and mum was getting her first experience in many years of the tube, with my complete guidance as she followed looking very bemused. She was pretty nervous at the speed and noise of the trains, but I have to say she was way more chill than I was expecting! We beelined straight for the theatre box office and collected our tickets so that we could relax the rest of the day safe in the knowledge that we were ready to attend.
The next stop for us was of course the famous Oxford Street. We wanted to check out the super sized versions of many of our favourite shops, but mainly I'll be honest, we were there for the giant Primark. We swung in a couple of places, including HMV as "This is the End" was finally released (if you haven't seen this already I highly recommend it) and Miss Selfridge where I found the most beautiful dress ever with a hefty price tag of £100. Needless to say, I came home without it. If you're in the area, I would definitely recommend dropping into Miss Selfridge at the moment, as not only do they currently have a great selection of party dresses, but many have a stunning and detailed vintage design, some 20s Downtown Abbey style, some flapper dresses and some big 50s style, but all uniquely gorgeous (and expensive! Be warned). We also swung into the Disney Store because the Oxford street is awesome and has many photo opportunities. That and I'm a big Disney fangirl, deal with it.
We trekked for hours down this street (literally, we had to stop at John Lewis for some tea and everything) taking in the sights in search of Primark. We even stumbled across Selfridges with it's world famous window designs, and had to get a few snaps of that. However I must say I was way more impressed with John Lewis's creative animal designs and took many a picture of those. Anyway, we finally made it to Primark but were already knackered, it was packed as office hours had finished, and we were running out of time so it was kind of a hurried trip. I still managed to find a few gems though. Maybe in a week or so I will show you some of my recent winter and work wardrobe purchases ;)
We stopped off at John Lewis again for another pot of tea, and to rest our little legs quickly before realising that, you guessed it, we were going to be late for the theatre if we didn't move like now. We again had to run the whole way to the tube station, barely made the train, then had to run from the station to the theatre itself. We made it with minutes to spare and dropped off our huge shopping bags in the cloakroom. Thank god we did. We had front row centre seats in the dress circle (expensive but very worth it, best view in the house and the actors feel within touching distance) and I'm sure we both remembered these seats having more leg room. After a frantic day, we had been looking forward to lying right back in our seats to relax, but it was similar to the leg room on a plane (good practise for me I guess!). If you do book these seats, I advice to travel light or like us drop your shopping in the cloakroom, it's only £1 per item.
The view was spectacular and the show blew us both away, even though it was our 3rd time each. The actors that played Valjean (Daniel Koek) and Fantine (Na-Young Jeon) this season were incredible, I think the best we've ever actually seen. We laughed, we cried and we applaused until our arms hurt. We haven't stopped singing the songs or raving about the show since.
Anyway, I had a fantastic time with my mum. I was a little gutted we ran out of time to go to Camden, as I wanted her to experience the awesomeness that is the Camden food court, and would have loved to shock her with the characters that fill the area haha! I guess there's always next time ;)
Moral of the trip: things may not always go to plan, but sometimes life has a more memorable experience in mind for you.
Puddy <3
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