England, part III

On Saturday, we got up and at'em and the 3 of us grabbed the train into London.  It's an easy, 45 minute train ride right to Liverpool Street station.  Then we tubed over to Camden Market to do some exploring and shopping.  The walk from the station down to the actual market is a bit ... alternative.  Lots of tattoo and piercing shops.  Emily and I were a little concerned that everything would be like that.  But once we got down to the market, it was more of what we expected - tourist stuff, scarves, jewelry, food, and much more. 

 

This was bizarre.  Have you seen anything like it?!  These fish things attach themselves to your feet and EAT away the dead skin.  Oh. How. Gross.   There were lines of women waiting to do this!!

We each bought a couple of things.  D got this 'awesome' tshirt, which he proudly put on immediately, fold lines and everything... he also purchased another one, but I'll refrain from mentioning the graphic...

Em and I each got a few magnets, and some paintings.  We both got the black and white one below, and she also got a beautiful one of London but in lots of bright colors.  It's just on the canvas, so I need to get a wood frame to wrap it around and find a place to put it! 

Once we finished up at the market, we took the tube up to Highgate in North London.  We were all starving, so we popped into the first pub we saw, The Woodman. 



Picture from www.the-woodman.com

It was one of the prettiest I'd ever seen.  It had the rustic, dark wood feel as so many of them do.  But it also had some beautiful plum and lilac color accents.  After a couple of pints and lunch, we headed out and walked down Archway towards the city.  Highgate is a beautiful neighborhood, and one of the most expensive places in London to live.  Archway is lined with houses, shops and pubs. 

While the scenery was beautiful, that wasn't the only reason we were up there.  One of the blogs Emily reads told her about this dry goods sale that was being held in a church that afternoon.  It was the spring fair of a magazine, Selvedge.  

The fair had 30 exhibitors with so many beautiful things.  There were lots of linens, pillows, lace, and so much more.  It was such a treat to find this local sale going on.   

After slowly go from booth to booth, ooohing and ahhhing over everything, it was time to head back to Picadilly - we went to see The 39 Steps at Criterion Theater.  The theater, which opened in 1874, was just beautiful.  The carvings were very detailed.  The play was great - with only 4 actors play 139 roles, it was quite entertaining.  We even had an ice cream treat at intermission!  

After the play, we wandered (and wandered) around (and around) trying to find a pub that had the Arsenal game on it.  We walked up Pall Mall, a large main street known for it's beautiful gentlemen's clubs (not that type of gentlemen's club...) built in the 19th and early 20th centuries.  We walked by Fortnum & Mason and up this very 'posh' street, Jermyn, and made note for our trip back town (without D) on Monday...we also walked around Soho, which was a bit of a surprise for me.  I was thinking more of the NY Soho, not the gay red light district that it is.  After a couple of hours of walking and no luck, we finally just decided on one to go in and have a pint.  

Once refreshed, we moved onto Chinatown.  Another pub and another pint later, we were starving.  Chinatown was the place for dinner that evening, so we found a busy restaurant called The Golden Dragon and walked right in. With 78 restaurants and 12 pubs in the area, you really have to just pick one and go with it.  The food was wonderful - and SO much of it.  My favorite was the roast duck - it was fantastic.  We were there for literally hours, and the place was still packed - they were seating new tables when we left close to midnight.  We finally rolled out just in time to jump in a taxi and make it to Liverpool for the last train home.