Déjà Vu: Kensington Gardens & Sensational Butterflies

About this time three years ago, I decided to start taking a day off a week to get on a train and go somewhere.

This was basically one of the best decisions I've ever made. I've been on loads of Nice Days Out since then and am now totally hooked on exploring new places... and am positively evangelical about the importance of carving out time in your schedule to have a proper day off no matter how long your To Do list.

My very first Nice Day Out was a trip to Kensington Gardens, the Royal Geographical Society, the V&A and the butterfly exhibit at the Natural History Museum. When I sat down to write today's blog post - all about a morning I spent in London a few months ago - I realised that I'd recreated this first Nice Day Out almost exactly. What can I say, I love these places! They're awesome!

This time round I had excellent company - Polly was in town for the day and we had a busy schedule of places to visit to squeeze as much London-goodness into her trip as possible.

We started at Kioskafé, grabbing something to drink and oohing over their fabulous selection of magazines.

Then we walked to Kensington Gardens. The park was looking lush in the late spring sunshine - look at the loveliness that greeted us just inside the park!

We wandered through the Italian Gardens, and looked down the Long Water.

There were so many swans on the lake - and lots of cute little cygnets, too! Just look at those little fluffy fellas.

We headed down the right hand side of the Long Water, which is wonderfully wild around the edges and is also where you'll find the famous Peter Pan statue.

Reaching the other side of the park, we took a small detour to admire the shininess of the Albert Memorial (so darn shiny).

Then we headed down Exhibition Road, calling in at the Royal Geographical Society for their (then) current exhibition, photos of Britain from the air. I love the RGS, they always have such interesting exhibitions and they're a little oasis of quiet and calm away from the hustle and bustle of the main Kensington museums.

Talking of busy museums... next we visited the Natural History Museum for a quick zip round some of the galleries (top tip: use the Exhibition Road entrance, it's usually much quicker than the queue at the main entrance). This building never fails to enchant, and it is practically bursting at the seams with interesting things to see and learn.

Outside the museum in the summer is the Sensational Butterflies exhibition  - a temporary tropical butterfly house. This is basically pure joy, purchasable for a few quid. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Giddy from the magic of the butterflies, we went to the V&A for a late lunch and lots of oohing over the amazing building and its amazing contents (did I mention that the V&A is amazing? The V&A is amazing, you guys, so amazing).

Then we headed to the Tube for part two of our day... but you'll have to wait until another time to hear about that :)

A Short Walk along the Thames: Tate Britain to Westminster

Last week my mum and I took a trip to the Dulwich Picture Gallery to visit their Astrup exhibition. This was excellent - so many gorgeous paintings and beautiful woodcut prints, and all by an artist I'd never heard of until this exhibition was announced.

You can watch a short video about the exhibition here and read about a previous trip of mine to Dulwich here.

After viewing the exhibition, visiting the shop and having a quick look round the main gallery (I especially love this painting in their collection) we headed back towards central London for lunch. A short train and Tube ride later and we were at Tate Britain - they do very tasty lunches here and it's always nice to have an excuse to pop in and look at the art!

Tate Britain doesn't have the flash of its younger, bigger sister Tate Modern but it's free to visit and has some wonderful art (including many of my all time faves)... and the building itself is pretty nice too.

As it was a nice sunny afternoon we decided to walk along the Thames to Westminster and catch the Tube home from there, as I'd (shockingly) never walked along this bit of the river before. It turned out to be a lovely little walk and (like so many places in central London) absolutely jam packed with history.

We both admired this interesting-looking building... which Google informs me is the headquarters of the Security Service, MI5! The MI6 building is just over the river, too.

 

A little further along the road you come to Victoria Tower Gardens, which are home to a very decorative memorial.

The Buxton Memorial commemorates the emancipation of slaves in the British Empire in 1834. It was originally located in Parliament Square but was moved to Victoria Tower Gardens in the 1950s. There are also a couple of interesting statues in the park, including one of the suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst.

 

You get great views from the park of the Palace of Westminster (home to the Houses of Parliament), after whose looming Victoria Tower the park is named.

 

 

Looking up river you also get a great view of Westminster Bridge and the London Eye.

The Palace of Westminster probably needs no introduction but it really is a fabulous building, all Victorian Gothic splendour.

 

 

 

Westminster Abbey - just over the road - is similarly impressive. When I mentioned to my mum that I'd never been to the Abbey she was positively appalled, so I guess we'll be planning a day trip there sometime soon!

At the far end of the Palace there's the Elizabeth Tower with it's famous clock and the bell, Big Ben, which chimed three as we were walking through the park (Bong! Bong! Bong!).

The whole area is swarming with tourists, of course (most of whom are all trying to get a selfie with the clock in the background!) but don't let that put you off.

The buildings are truly wonderful in person (so much detail!) and whenever you see Westminster on the telly you can think "I've been there!" (not gonna lie, I find this hugely satisfying when I spot places I've visited).

All in all, a very nice end to our day out!

An Autumn Visit to Bath

A couple of weeks ago I had a Nice Day Out in Bath. I love Bath, but I don't visit nearly as often as I'd like - in fact, the last time I'd been to the city was way back in the spring of last year!

I was lucky to be able to book some extra cheap train tickets (hurrah) and even luckier that the weather forecast was for sunshine (double hurrah). Bath is always a gorgeous place but when the sun shines: wow. 

The morning actually started out quite gloomy and grey, with lots of mist rolling across the countryside outside my train window. Once my train arrived I walked from Bath station through the city centre, crossing Pulteney Bridge which has the cutest little shops and cafes along it.

 

I'd planned to walk straight to the Holburne Museum (my first stop for the day) but ended up taking a short detour through Henrietta Park after spotting all that lovely autumn colour.

 

When I finally arrived at the Holburne, it was definitely time for a cuppa!

I had some tea and a slice of very tasty cake in the museum cafe, then headed out through the back gates for a nose around the area.

The museum backs onto Sydney Gardens which was originally created as a pleasure garden in the eighteenth century, with a maze and other entertainments. The maze may have gone, but there are still some interesting buildings to see and a series of ornamental bridges over the railway and canal which pass through the Gardens.

Apparently there was public outrage when the canal was first built as it had to pass through the newly built Gardens, but all the bridges are just so charming and the canal itself is rather picturesque as well.

 

Next time I'm in Bath I must try and find the time for a stroll along the canalside!

By the time I'd finished my stroll around the Gardens, it was turning into quite a glorious day. What a difference a bit of sunshine makes, huh?

I had a look at some of my favourite exhibits in the Holburne Museum - which is mostly free to visit, and a place I'd highly recommend - then visited their current exhibitions.

Gold, an exhibition of 60 works on loan from the Royal Collection, was small but perfectly formed... and very, very shiny! There was a really interesting mix of golden art and objects on display and it was fascinating to watch the short videos about the different techniques for working with gold as a material.

Accompanying the main exhibition is Honey Bee, an incredibly intricate golden paper cut sculpture by Nahoko Kojima. The shadows cast by this are almost as beautiful as the paper cut itself and the skill required to make such a thing, my goodness, just incredible. 

I took my time walking back towards the city centre, enjoying the sunshine and the details of all the Georgian buildings (the rows of chimney pots, the symmetry, the smart front doors, etc). My eye was caught by this little watering can - I just love how it's the same colour as on the scaffolding outside the building.

My next stop was the Bath Postal Museum. I have to admit to going round in circles trying to find this museum! It turns out that it's in the basement of the current Post Office, and though it's listed as being on Northgate Street the entrance is actually tucked away on Green Street.

If you're interested in things like stamps and letter boxes (which I totally am) or you just love a nice little quirky museum this is a great place to visit. It's really thoughtfully put together, with a good balance of fun facts and nerdy details plus some interactive stuff for the kids - or not-completely-grown-ups, like me!

I was especially fascinated by their current exhibition, Wreck Mail: Letters from the Deep, a collection of letters that were carried on ships lost at sea due to enemy fire. The museum also has an extensive digital collection on its website of letters, postcards, etc, which includes lots more letters from shipwrecks (and mail from air crashes, too).   

After exploring the Postal Museum I grabbed a quick bite to eat then walked to Queen Square to visit the (now finished) Gathered Threads exhibition. Local textile artists had created work inspired by objects in the Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution's collection. The finished pieces were so varied and it was fascinating to see which objects had inspired each work and how each artist had translated a fossil or a fragment of pottery into fabric and thread. 

The square was looking lovely in the sunshine!

 

To make the most of the autumn sun (which was rapidly sinking in the sky), I walked through Victoria Park...

... on my way to my final touristy stop for the day: the Royal Crescent.

 

The Royal Crescent is always worth a visit simply because it's gorgeous, but you can also go inside one of the houses - No.1 Royal Crescent - which recreates a Georgian home, so you can step back in time and see how people lived in Bath when the Crescent was first built.

I'd visited the house before but wanted to make a return trip as they had a temporary exhibition of dolls houses and I can never resist an exhibition of dolls houses (so much tiny stuff! so many interesting details!)

I had a quick wander through the house, spent ages looking at all the dolls houses (delightful!), then met up with a blogger friend for some tasty cake and lots of nattering about making and blogging... and then, sadly, it was time to bid Bath farewell and head homewards.

Fingers crossed it takes less than a year and a half before I'm back there again!