A wonderful wet afternoon in London

I am sure you think that is a rather strange title for a post but last Thursday really was a wonderful afternoon, despite the rain, as I went bridal gown browsing for the first time with my daughter..............

She had an afternoon off from work and had booked a "trying on" appointment at a wedding dress shop just off Oxford Street at 3.30pm. As any Mum of a grown up daughter knows it is always important to meet up first for tea and cake! We had arranged to meet at the John Lewis department store for afternoon tea at 2.30pm. As I don't work on a Thursday I thought it would also be ideal for me to nip up to Carnaby Street before hand and pay a visit to the shop where I buy many of my silver findings and semi precious stones from.

It was a very wet afternoon but I thought it would be fun to take my trusty camera with me and take you all with me on my journey. I really love seeing photos of places I have not visited before on other peoples blogs and I realise that what is almost ordinary for me is not for other people, especially my friends overseas.

So here we go, this was my journey. I have lived either in or just outside of London my whole life. Our house in Surrey is only a 25 minute journey to Victoria Station in London where I can jump on to the tube and actually be standing in Oxford Street in 45 minutes from leaving home. I love it.... My Hb works in London and commutes there every weekday.

I have an Oyster card which I swipe for all the parts of my journey. To explain to those of my friends who are abroad this is a "Pay as you go" system for all the transport modes in and around London...buses, train, trams and the tube. I can swipe in at my local train station and keep swiping all the time on buses, tubes etc and only have to pay a maximum capped fare. It is a very efficient system. Now usually Oyster cards are just boring with writing on but I have this one......

I bought it several years ago when the Tutankhamen exhibition was at the O2 exhibition centre. It came as part of a deal with the entrance ticket. I did not realise how rare it is....no one else, sometimes even ticket inspectors seem to be aware of its existence! It is fun to own...I just top it up with money when it runs low. My Hb owns one too and I have not seen any others although there must be a few more out there?

I travel up to Victoria Rail station from my local railway station ...Victoria is a busy London station...this is the platform I arrive at..

From Victoria I jumped on the tube, it is always a bustle and is busy at any time of the day. I love crowds though and people watching. Everyone is busy trying to get somewhere else. The good thing is that the underground trains arrive every few minutes so if you cannot squeeze onto one there is always one right behind!

Above is the entrance to the tube at Victoria, luckily it is inside the station so I could keep dry.

This is actually quite a quiet time would you believe!
I took the tube to Oxford Circus which is the nearest stop for both Carnaby Street and John Lewis.

Oxford Circus now has a rather interesting crossing where you are able to cross in any direction and it is now really easy to just walk diagonally across to Regent Street.

You can see on the left one of the last "Bendy buses" which are going to be phased out when the new Route Master buses are launched. I can remember travelling to school every day on the old Route Master buses. They were so easy to jump on and off as there was no door in those days, just a platform. There was no Oyster payment system, a conductor took your real money and gave you a ticket. I can remember sitting on the seats and my little legs did not quite reach the floor when I was small.

I walked down Regent Street under my brolly and nipped round the back of  Liberty's. The back entrance of this wonderful shop is just as interesting as the rest of this very beautiful building - but in the rain we tend to just hurry by.

My destination in Carnaby Street was a small Mall which has lots of specialist shops arranged on 3 levels around an open cafe area.

I also had to walk past one of my favourite shoe shops!!

After picking up my jewellery findings I made my way back up to John Lewis for our afternoon tea.

John Lewis is my Mum and my favourite shop and we have spent many hours over the years in here. When I was pregnant I used to meet my Mum in the coffee shop and then go to the baby department...that was nearly 25 years ago now.  Over the years the shop has been completely refurbished and hardly looks like the store I knew in the late 60s early 70s. It is now so light and airy, a real pleasure to shop there.

I met my daughter on time and we made our way to the cafe to share a cream tea......tea, freshly baked scone, raspberry jam and clotted cream. Mmmmmmmmmmm- I'm afraid we had already eaten if before I thought of taking a photo but believe me it was delicious!





It was then time for the appointment at the wedding dress shop. I cannot give much away as this part of her wedding plans is obviously secret ,but when my daughter came out from behind the curtain in the first dress I got the lump in the throat that only a Mum can get when she sees her darling daughter in a wedding dress. Yes she looked totally beautiful. I was really delighted. She tried lots of different designs on and there are other places to look at too but it was a wonderful start to this journey towards her wedding next year! It was a really wonderful wet afternoon in London.

We finished off our afternoon by meeting my Hb from work and the 3 of us enjoyed an Italian meal in Farringdon..... perfect!

I hope you enjoyed a trip around a very rainy Oxford Street, London too!

Bye for now,

Jane x