obriensineurope: London calling

Well rested after our inter-continental flight, we set forth for London Zoo. The weather looked gloomy, rain imminent (yes, we are yet to realize that this is the weather every day), so we changed plans and headed for the Natural History Museum. On Clifton Road, we bought bus passes 'Oysters', kids under 11 free. Caity now 10 again, we boarded the number 414. Kids loved their front row seat upstairs, driving the bus.

It is truly an outstanding museum. The upside of hundreds of years of ruthless, acquisitive colonialism is that all the very best stuff is here. Rare? Unique? Extinct? No problem! We saw the most extraordinary collection of ichthyosaur fossils. It included specimens giving birth, proving that these aquatic dinosaurs were live bearing. We saw stuffed dodos and auks - extinct flightless birds. We saw a life-size model of a blue whale, together with a skeleton. So big, so grand, so sad.

Then we wandered off to Harrods to leer at the food hall. Australian wagyu a snip at $A300/kg, iberian jamon a snort at $500/kg. Fully loaded with our souvenir tin of lollies, we pressed on. Next stop - to gawk at the Sloane Rangers, corner of Knightsbridge and Sloane, Knightsbridge. So cool. The best moment was when a distracted, mobile-phone chatting middle-aged Sloane was horn-blasted by a like Sloane in Jag. She jumped about a metre, but landed like a cat and glided on.

On to Hyde Park, where we fed the wildlife. A squirrel tried to climb into Syl's bag and my jeans (this is where and why skinny jeans were invented), before passing Marble Arch on our way to Waitrose and home.

Garden at back of our apartment