Busy Season Shenanigans - Part One

From mid January through the end of February are my official "busy season" at work. It really doesn't keep me all that busy, at least compared to how it was back home (with 60+ hours every week for 2 months), but it is busy enough that we can't really plan to take any trips. Because of that, we've been forced to find alternative activities here in London, which has been good because we've been able to check a few things off our list. This post is going to cover a few of the things that we've been doing since our trip to Budapest.

Blogging

As you may have noticed, there was a significant break in our postings over the last couple months. This wasn't at all due to a lack of activity, but really the opposite - we were travelling so much and so busy with work that we didn't have time to blog. Now that we've been spending some more time at home, we've been able to catch up a bit, which is why we've posted about 12 times in February.

Seeing Some Shows

Jenna did some research and found out that several of the West End theatres sell "day of" tickets that are great seats for very cheap. We were able to get some good and cheap tickets to both Wicked and Billy Elliot. The seats are in the front couple of rows, which is officially "restricted view" because they are so close to the stage that you can't quite see the actors' feet. Not a problem for us, especially since the tickets were the same price as the nose-bleeds and we mostly go to hear the amazing music! Only negative point is that you have to show up to the theatre pretty early in the morning to stand in line, which was not the best way to spend a Saturday morning, but well worth it.

Wicked was great as always. This was Jenna's fourth time and my third (second time in London for both of us). It is by far her favorite musical, and I don't hate it, so it works out great for us to see. It was interesting from the front row. It felt like the actors were singing to us!! It was a little weird, though, when the smoke from the stage wafted its way down into our faces. It became an experience of not only sight and sound, but also smell!!!

Billy Elliot was actually a little disappointing. We've had this show on our list since we came here, and I think we'd either built it up, or it was just really bad. For one, we weren't too impressed with the story. Neither of us had seen the movie or anything, so we were going in blind, and we thought the thing was just so-so. We were also put off by the language, which was really bad. LOTS of cursing. Not that we have a problem with a few here and there, but it seemed excessive and unnecessary, especially considering the number proportion of the cast that were children. Lastly, we thought the music was just "okay." It was all mostly good, but none of it was really spectacular. It wasn't a problem of the singers, who were great, but I think just the songs themselves weren't that good. The one thing that was impressive was the dancing, especially out of the 12 year old kid star, who was impressive in his acting talents as well. So anyway, we were glad we went, but extra glad that the tickets were cheap!
Jenna did also go see the Grease musical recently with Anne. She loved it, I loved the fact that I didn't have to go! Apparently it was very much like the movie, other than a few new songs and some differences in the order. She did say it really brought her back to her jr. high school days when she went to her best friend Erin Hilligus' house and they would watch the show and sing along.

Afternoon Tea

I'm not sure whether this is supposed to be called "high tea" or just "afternoon tea" or if it is something else all together, but whatever it is we did it.

All of the fancy hotels in town have dining rooms that serve this big fancy tea in the afternoons. It is a several hour event that involves eating finger sandwiches, scones with clotted cream and jam, little desserts, and of course your choice of different teas. They charge a pretty penny for this, but from what everyone we talked to said, it is a must-do experience.

We've been wanting to do this for months, and finally decided to just go ahead and do it. We really wanted to go to the Ritz, but they were literally booked up every weekend for 3 months, so we passed on that. Eric and Anne decided that they wanted to go as well, so we decided to go together, and they ended up finding a place with an opening - the Lanesborough Hotel. This is just outside Hyde Park and is one of the most prestigious hotels in London, and has been the choice of multiple celebrities, politicians, and even royalty. This of course means that it is also very expensive - with rooms costing up to $13,000 per night (that come with a private butler), it is supposedly the most expensive hotel in London. Luckily, the price of their tea package was about the same as all of the other fancy places in town. We had a really fun time. The tea sommolier (who even knew that existed?) helped us choose the perfect tea pairings for the various courses of our small meal.

The food and tea were both incredible. We've started drinking more tea since we came over here, and this was definitely the best we've had. We tried blacks and greens and even whites from around the world, and they were all spectacular. We ended up sitting there for over 2 hours just chatting and nibbling on food and drinking away. It was really probably one of the best experiences that we've had here, and we were so glad we did it! Another Tourist Day

On one of our free Saturdays, we decided to finally take the time ot go to the last couple of museums we hadn't seen yet - the Old Operating Theatre and the Tate Britain.

The Tate Britian is a museum full of painting from the British masters. It was relatively small but had some good stuff. We wished we would have come here before going to some of the other museums, though, because it was a little unimpressive when compared to the likes of the National Gallery and others. There were some really great works there (nothing "famous"), but since they've limited themselves to British artists only, it seemed like they had put up quite a few average pieces just to fill the walls. It was definitely worth the trip, but we didn't spend a lot of time here, and were glad that like most London museums and galleries it was free.

The other stop for the day was the Old Operating Theatre. This is hidden away inside the roof of a church that used to be connected to a hospital, and is the oldest operating theatre in Europe, being built in the 1820s. And if you don't know what this thing is, think a small room with an operating table and a standing room behind, made for watching surgery. This picture should help clarify: Being a nurse who works in the recovery room, this was high on Jenna's list. There was a small museum outside the actual operating room that showed some of the medical instruments and things from the time, which were really interesting. Aneasthesia wasn't discovered until later, so many of the surgeries that took place here were probably very painful. And can you imagine being cut open on that little wooden table with 50 people standing around watching? The most interesting thing was the box of sawdust under the table. This caught the excess blood and kept it off the floor as much as possible. Actually, it was a false floor - sitting six inches above the real flooring. This area was also completely filled with sawdust - they didn't want blood to seep through the floor and start dripping down into the church below!!
Valentine's Day in the City

Jenna and I celebrated Valentine's Day pretty casually on the Friday before, with a nice Italian dinner and a great chick flick. Sunday, the actual day, we spent on an extended date in the city. We started out with a lighter version of tea at the Orangerie. This used to be the greenhouse of Kensington Palace (read on for more info), but is now a small cafe. Our friends Nick and Nathalie had gone here on their visit and highly recommended it. It wasn't nearly as fancy as the Lanesborough, but it was also fairly affordable and still pretty delicious, so overall well worth it.
After tea we headed across the gardens into Kensington Palace. This was the British Royal Palace before Buckingham was built, and is located in one of the corners of Hyde Park. It was 50% museum and 50% old palace apartments. The apartments were just so-so, about like what we've seen elsewhere. The museum was interesting, though, especially to Jenna. About half of is was a permanent exhibition related to Princess Diana, who had lived here from the time she got married to Prince Charles until her death. They had a bunch of old dresses on display and it talked mainly about her contribution to fashion.
The other half was, I think, temporary, and was devoted to "the last debutantes". If you're like me and don't know what a debutante is, they were the young women of high society, and their debutante year was basically their "coming out" year where they were announced as being of age and available, starting their life as ladies. During "the season" they would go to countless balls, dinners, and other activities to get their name and face out there and rub shoulders with the elite. You could get away cheaper, but a girl that attended every event and went all out could spend up to $200,000 (in today's money) in the season. They had a bunch of things about being a "deb" like how to curtsey and table manners, etc. They also had some of the dresses worn in the last season (the practice was officially stopped after 1958). It was interesting to learn about this different way of living. Apparently some families would go into enormous debt, mortgage the house, sell the family jewels, etc in order to get their daughters out there. I guess if it meant she married a prince or duke or something it might be worth it, but pretty crazy.
We left the palace and went over to St Paul's Cathedral for their evening Eucharist service. Jenna had overslept so we missed church, and thought this would be an excellent opportunity to visit this church. It was really cool, and we were so glad we went. The service was very liturgical - lots of responsive readings, stand up, sit down, etc, but it was so different than what we're used to. They started by lighting incense which filled the cavernous church and smelled great. It was also really cool to just hear a service in this huge church, with all the echoes and everything. We visit all these cathedrals where you aren't supposed to talk above a whisper, but here we got to hear what it is really supposed to sound like. It was really a great experience!!

Jenna in Venice

One of the best things about living in Europe is being able to catch a relatively cheap flight and jet off to another country very easily. So when your college roommate says she is going to be in Italy and Spain for a few weeks and asks if you can meet her somewhere along the way you can say "Yes!"

My college roommate, Laura Banks, went to PA school after college at Emory. She graduated in December 2009 and took her boards the following February. As a grauduation gift to herself for all of her hard work she took a trip to Europe, along with another girlfriend from PA school. When she asked me to join her and gave me her itinerary I decided I wanted to join her in Venice, since it was one of my favorite Italian cities. This also happened to be during Aaron's busy season so he was working long hours and spending most of his time in the office. So it was the perfect time for a girls getaway!

I flew in to Venice February 8th in the morning and made my way to our hotel to wait for Laura and her friend Sarah to join me. Luckily it was a nice sunny day so I was able to sit by the Grand Canal and people watched while I waited.

 

One thing to note is that I had always traveled in Europe with Aaron at my side. I hadn't gone anywhere really without him, besides around town in London. He is amazing at figuring out maps and directions and which way is north. I, however am the complete opposite! If I am unsure which way to go and I choose which way to go I always, without fail, make the wrong choice. Also to note Venice is very hard to navigate. The streets are small and mostly unmarked. There are all sorts of canals in the way. You can be going down a street and turn a corner and the only place to go is into the canal. It is an extremely easy city to get lost in! So I was a little apprehensive traveling with Laura and Sarah not knowing if they were navigationally challenged or not.

After awhile Laura and Sarah met me at the hotel and after dropping all of our luggage off and freshening up we were ready to hit the streets/canals of Venice! We made our way to St. Mark's Square to get our bearings. This was Laura and Sarah's first time to Venice so I got to show them around a little bit. They did surprise me though and were great with directions! I think I told them numerous times over the three days how thankful I was that they knew how to read a map!!

 

 

 

After getting our bearings in the square we decided to go into St. Mark's Basilica. After all the many cathedrals and basilica's we had been in I think St. Mark's is one of my favorites. It is amazing when you walk in and you see all the gold mosaics it is just breathtaking. It is so big and open on the inside and just beautiful. Unfortunately there are no pictures allowed inside so you will have to go check it out yourself.

Next we made our way next door to the Doge's Palace. Luckily Laura and Sarah had become fans of Rick Steves, just like Aaron and me, so we followed his tour of the Palace. I believe we described the Palace in our post of our previous trip to Venice. There are no photos allowed inside of the Doge's Palace, but I was able to sneak a few...

After leaving the Palace it was starting to get late so we enjoyed some people watching in the square and headed off to find a place for dinner. The wonderful thing about Italy is that their food is so delicious! We enjoyed some delicious pasta and pizza and headed back to the hotel. After getting turned around a few times we made it back safely and with full bellies and tired feet we went to bed to rest up for the next day of adventures!

 

The place we stayed included breakfast every morning but they did not have a breakfast room. So instead we told the innkeeper what time we wanted breakfast and they delivered it on a tray to us the next morning. Breakfast in bed or room service is one of my greatest joys in life! Aaron and I never get room service in a hotel just because it is so expensive and the food is not so good! We did have room service all the time on our honeymoon because we stayed at an all inclusive resort and this was included of course! So to have our breakfast delivered to us in the morning was a true delight!

 

After having breakfast we started our day with a stroll around Venice. We happened to be there during Carnival. We were thrilled to find out that Carnival in Venice means that locals and tourists alike dress up in baroque dress, see the following photos. We had a great time seeing everyone's costumes that some had spent a year working on. Several of the people we saw were walking around as couples in matching costumes!

 

 

 

 

 

Eventually we made our way to the Rialto Bridge where we battled the crowds to take the obligatory Rialto Bridge pictures. Honestly I love it and I cannot get enough of Venice and the canals and the scenic briges over the canals. The whole city is just so romantic to me! It is a great place to fall in love again! Too bad my husband wasn't with me on this trip!! After all that walking it was time to refuel with some pizza and gelato! :) Yummy!

 

 

For the afternoon we had plans to take the vaparetto out to the island of Murano to go to the glass blowing factories. We even indulged in a glass blowing show and it was fascinating to watch. After spending the afternoon on the island and spending too much money on glass souvenirs we headed back to Venice for one more delicious dinner of pasta.

 

The next morning Laura and Sarah had to get up early to catch a train to the next city on their European tour. I rode on the Vaparetto with them to send them off and to have one of the best views of the city, from the Grand Canal. When I got back to the hotel I enjoyed my breakfast and took my time getting ready before I had to depart to go back home to London.

It was a quick two days in Venice but I am so glad that I got to spend that time catching up with Laura and meeting her friend Sarah. We had a great time navigating the city, soaking up the history, savoring the delicious food and watching all the costumed carnivalers. It was an amazing two days and I am so thankful that Laura invited me to join them on their European tour!

 

Budapest, Hungary

A while back we were really debating which Eastern European city to visit - Krakow or Budapest? In the end we decided on Krakow, as it was supposed to be the better of the two. About 3 weeks after that decision, we realized that we would only regret missing out on Budapest, so we just ended up doing both.

Saturday, January 16th

The flight times to and from Budapest were far from ideal, but with it being my busy season we had to squeeze it into a Sat/Sun. Our mid-morning flight didn't get us into the city until around noon, so we were pretty much off and running as soon as we arrived.

Our first stop was over to grab food from the main city market. This giant market place has been around for hundreds of years. On the ground floor they sell all kinds of meats and produce and other things you'd expect of a market. Upstairs they have a bunch of shops selling touristy goods and then a few cheap "fast food" restaurants selling traditional Hungarian fare. We both tried some interesting (and pretty tasty) local dishes - I went with the goulash over rice, while Jenna had a veggie and cheese filled crepe.

Our next stop was the top-rated site in the city and one of the two main things that brought us here - the Szechenyi Baths. Budapest is built over some natural hot springs, and as such they've built up several thermal baths, of which Szenchenyi is the largest and most famous. It is a giant complex that was built in the late 1800s, and is of a grand design. You go through the doors, change clothes in a little closet, and leave your stuff in a locker before heading into the baths. The baths themselves are really just several rooms full of pools of differing sizes and water temperatures. The highlight by far, though, is the outdoor baths.

There are 3 large pools in the complex's central courtyard. A long rectangular pool in the middle which is "capped" on both ends by semicircular pools. They range from around 70 to 95 degrees. Each pool has a few little areas with jets and waterfalls and whatnot, but the main thing to do was just sit back and relax. Needless to say, we were here in January, so it was a little cold outside - like around 30 degrees. Let me tell you that this made for a very interesting run from the doors to the pools (when we were still dry), and an even more interesting one from the first pool to the second (when we were wet). It was terribly cold outside, especially to be wearing nothing but a swimsuit, but the pools were amazing. It was super relaxing to just sit in the 95 degree water, steam rising up all around you into the sub-freezing air outside. It was really an amazing experience.

After wandering through the inside of the complex a bit and soaking in a few of those pools, we had to head back to the hotel to get dressed up for the other main thing that brought us to Budapest - the opera.

With all of these beautiful opera houses that we've seen in our travels, we figured we really needed to see an actual performance while we were here. The problem is that, at least in London, it is terribly expensive. The nose-bleed seats with restricted view cost about $70 each, so we had been putting it off and had really mostly decided that we wouldn't be able to do it. Fortunately, though, Budapest is somewhat famous for its opera, and it is unbelievably cheap.

We booked tickets in advance for Mozart's "The Magic Flute", which according to our celebrity friend Chad (who is an opera aficionado) is "as Disney as opera can get". We knew that was going to be perfect for us. The best part is that we got the most expensive tickets in the theatre - box seats. The cost? $18 each. If this were in London the box seats would be nearly $1,000. What a deal!

When we talked about going people thought is was crazy since, well, they speak Hungarian. Our thought, though, was that since it was an Italian opera, nobody would be able to understand, so we'd be fine. We did a little research into the basic story line before we went, but as it turned out this play did have quite a bit of regular dialogue - in Hungarian. We were able to enjoy the music and knew in general what was going on, but there were definitely multiple occasions where the crowd would respond in laughter and we had no idea why. Even so, it was a great experience. The music was pretty good and the seats and view were incredible. We were so glad to be able to have this opportunity to get some culture!

Sunday, January 17th

Sunday was set to be our day to do all the tourist activities in the city. The city itself is actually two different towns - Buda and Pest - that are separated by the Danube river but were merged into one city back in the late 1800s. We were on the Pest side, but a lot of the historical sites, including things like the palaces and main cathedral, were all on the Buda side, which is across the river and on top of a big hill. There wasn't anything in particular up there that we were dying to see, but we wanted to go and just walk around and take it in.

We had plans for the afternoon and evening, so we knew we needed to go there first thing in the morning. Since it is on the top of a big hill, there was no subway service, so you have the option of a bus or walking about a mile uphill. We obviously decided to take the bus. It turns out that the trip was not meant to be - we happened to be in town during a week of bus strikes, something we didn't find out until after we got home. After waiting at the bus stop for about 15 minutes (and having two scheduled buses not come), we knew something was up. We had the option to walk it, but we decided we didn't have enough time that it would take to hike all the way over and up, so we gave up on this site, which was really disappointing.

After giving up, we sulked our way over to the parliament building, which was not too far away. This is one of the city's architectural highlights, and it was pretty cool. They copied a lot of the design from the parliament in in London, so it has a general Gothic look, but then they topped it with a big dome, which is definitely not Gothic at all. I think the general consensus among snobby architects is that this mix is awful, but we loved it. We thought this was a much cooler building than the famous one in London.

We next walked down the Danube a bit to the very interesting holocaust memorial. There is a cement walkway running along the banks of the river, and the memorial is numerous pairs of bronzed empty shoes. Apparently, hundreds of citizens were murdered here on the river bank. The story goes that they would tie several people together, shoot one, and throw them all into the river. The dead body drug everyone else down and saved the Germans a few bullets. These empty shoes were a stark memorial to those who lost their lives.

From the Nazis, we moved onto the Communists. Like the rest of Eastern Europe, Hungary was liberated by the Russians and quickly fell under the Iron Curtain. Over the years, numerous statues were erected to tout the power of the state. After the fall of communism, most cities destroyed these statues, but a few ingenious Hungarians bought them up and set up them up for display in a park outside the city. To tell the truth, we really thought that this park was one visited a couple of seasons ago on The Amazing Race (our favorite show), and that was the main reason we wanted to go. Turns out that park is in Moscow.

We still enjoyed ourselves - there were several huge statues around, including a big platform where they used to have all the big demonstrations. It used to be topped by a statue of Stalin, but he was literally chopped down at the knees during the 90s - the top part of the statue was destroyed and all that was left were his feet. They also had a very small museum that played a video about being a communist spy. Someone had taken old secret police training videos and created an interesting look at how they operated. It covered everything from how to act when you meet an informant in a restaurant to how to follow a suspect to how to properly break into and search a house. One of the main tips - if you're ransacking someone's house and the phone starts ringing, don't answer!!! One of the best parts, though, was the little car near the entrance. These were as bad as they look, but as it was the only option they were in such high demand that you had to pay in advance and then wait a few years to take delivery - the marvel of communist engineering!

After leaving this park we headed back to the city and decided to warm up with a cup of tea and a late lunch. We went to the city's famous Gerbaud cafe, which is apparently the place to be, but apparently not at mid-afternoon on a freezing cold Sunday. The tea and food were both excellent, though maybe a little over priced, and the cafe itself was pretty cool. Funnily, though, the only other people in the place were other tourists, also trying to take pictures of themselves without looking touristy.

Our final main stop for the day was the House of Terror. Hungary was in a very interesting situation during and after WWII. They actually officially sided with the Nazis in the war, although they didn't really provide a lot of military support. There was a puppet Nazi government set up in the country and lots of good strong supporters. After the war, the Communists moved in and everybody basically just switched their allegiances. Interestingly, the headquarters of the secret police for both the Nazis and the Communists were in the same building. Sounds like the perfect place for a museum, right?

It was a pretty cool place, with a soviet tank in the middle and then 3 stories of information on the history of the Nazis and Communists in Hungary. I won't go into too much of the details, but needless to say there was a pretty good deal of oppression. The basement was where both regimes did all of their interrogations and punishment, and they have left it as it was, with various prison cells, etc. The most interesting part, though, was the wall of shame - with pictures of hundreds of people who were part of either the Nazi or Communist power systems during the time, and committed various atrocities, but were never brought to justice. All of these are apparently wanted men or women but are in exile or hiding around the world.

After leaving the museum we still had a little bit of time before needing to get to the airport, so we stopped over in Heroes Square, a huge open plaza with a monument to the great Hungarian leaders, none of whom we recognized - although it was still a very nice monument.

At last we made our way back to the hotel to grab our bags and go home, but on the way we made sure we walked by the famous McDonalds, built in the 80s and the first major Western establishment to break through the Iron Curtain. The place was hugely popular; they couldn't call it "fast food" because the line was usually out the door and around the corner! We passed by and, well, it looked like a McDonalds, so we took a mental picture and were on our way back home.