We Ate the East End: Eating London Food Tours

We were a bit of a disaster. A hectic September with multiple trips to Manchester left us comatose for as long as life would let us until suddenly I was in London on a work trip with Ian set to join me for the weekend. What should have been a fun-filled outing was stressing us as we couldn't decide on a plan of attack and were completely overwhelmed with options. We've been here before, and clearly I am in that place again as it has taken me months to talk about one of the best things we've ever done in London!

We were saved from our indecision by an answer from heaven (or more specifically from twitter). Travels of  Adam connected us with the Eating London and just like that - we had a day of eating planned. As I said, heaven.

London Town- a Love Story in Pictures

As the source of my paternal roots, the place we were engaged and a pretty rockin place - we easily name London as one of our favorite cities.

Double Decker Buses! We happily took the seats at the front whenever we had a chance

A cheap flight from Berlin, we are always happy to return to the city and in our second venture we based ourselves in a little room in a flatshare just off of Brick Lane through AirBnB. We struggled with the pub closing hours of "no food after 6pm", discussed the short-comings of the much praised Tube, and ate and drank our way through the city.

Surprise Video (Only Partially Well Recieved)

Last time we were in London, this happened: Dec 5th, Day that will live in Infamy. Spur of the moment, we made a video in Piccadilly Circus with a surprise announcement. Unfortunately I am having trouble tracking it down, but it was just a sly hand wave with a ring that got some of the parents in a tizzy, and caught my dad blissfully unaware until my mum informed him we had just announced our engagement. 

As we wandered the square once again, we looked at each other & just couldn't resist freaking out the parents again:



We know- not very nice. My parents thought it was funny... once they got over their heart attack that it was, indeed, a joke.

To add to our current video extravaganza, how about a re-post of the video our good friend Phil helped us make for the wedding.

Cambridge: Quaint as F@#%

A lot of people seemed surprised we chose Cambridge over Oxford, but for us it seemed natural. Knowing we were going to be spending the majority of our time in London, a city we had at least briefly visited before, we wanted to see something different. And while Oxford is a legitimate city, Cambridge is kinda a prestigious yet sleepy college town. Perfect, we thought. Someday we will back & probably explore Oxford, but I can't say we were wrong in our estimations of what we would find in Cambridge.

Ian tries to Speak British

Had a lovely time in Cambridge & have just arrived in London. Ian is having a grand time picking up the local accent.

Ian Porter Everybody!

Booking Activities in England

We re-focused, got our shit together, and are almost ready for England. Kinda.

We discovered Groupon UK which people have been onto for eons and it is saving us loads of money. We are going to Sandown Park for jump racing for 19 pounds - which includes entrance into the premier section, 10 pound food voucher, and a 2 pound bet. Sounds like a dream date to me. Nice try wooing me Ian, I'm already your wife! Sucker.

We have also come upon some fascinating booking options. First, our booking for Hamlet at the Globe Theatre on Easter:

Has to be a joke, but we were dying to pit Baroness, Colonel, or Princess Ian for our title.
Then again, maybe it's not a joke. Europeans in general are obsessed with title (see Royal Wedding). In Germany, it is correct to use every title a person holds, like:
"Good evening Herr Professor Doktor Schmidt!"

Another encounter we have had in booking is investigating how to get to Sandown Park- the racetrack. Our poor asses will be heading there by the cheapest means possible. The very helpful website also included the most expensive, by helicopter:

Oh England, I can't wait to become better acquainted.

Really crazy excited about the horse racing. There is barely anything but flat Thoroughbred racing in the States (which I love) but man, oh man I can't wait for this. Count how many times a riderless horse is in the top 3:

Bad Habits in Trip Planning

Ian & I have the bad habit of planning a trip...and then planning another on top of it. We are heading to England over Easter,  but his dad just booked his tickets to visit in Berlin so now we are busy planning his travel arrangements and side trips to Denmark & Italy. The problem?

• Do we have a place to stay in Cambridge? NO
• Do we know what horse track has steeplechases during this holiday weekend? NO
• Do we know if the Roald Dahl museum is closed? NO
• Do we know how to get from Stanstead to Cambridge? NO
• Do we know if we should take the train or bus in & out from the airport? NO
• Are all of our dishes washed? Again, a resounding NO

Need to get back into that Engy excitement. This may seem as if it would have the opposite effect, but I am going to explore some English cuisine and culture to get my Brit back.

These are my People

My dad is actually first generation American. His parents and older brother were all full-bloodied Eng. And despite that, all 4 boys could not even imitate their parents accent. Seriously!? Alfred's accent seemed so exotic and sophisticated, which is something for a man that was fist fighting well into grandpa-dom.

Despite frequent goadings, my dad & uncles are vague in the extreme about their parents. Some of our favorite stories are well preserved

(the family friend of a mafia man my grandma wouldn't let in the house; the theft of a farmer's pig while my grandpa held the title of "game warden";
the terrible driving due to the loss of one eye in "the war";
the battles with rooster "Rambo" in his California suburb)

And the destination is...

Feel a little bad saying this considering the votes, but Mr. Porter & I are headed to England in April!

Greg, Ian's dad, is visiting in the summer & is dieing to go to Italy. Thus, we will go on that trip, but just a little later in the year. We have only spent a long weekend in London, so we are excited to see more of the city and do some day trip.

The Proposal - Tower Bridge in London

A few months after relocating to Berlin, we were ready to stretch our legs and try another foreign country - England! The craziest thing was something I knew nothing about...

To facilitate all our London dreams we had purchased a one-day London Pass which allowed for free access into many attractions, but only for one day. Thus, a strategy was needed: See everything FAST!

The Plan:

Hit Shakespeare's Globe Theatre right at open, take the Tube over to the Winston Churchill Museum War Rooms, make brass rubbings beneath a church, ride over to the Tower of London and explore the grounds, then finish off with a view of the city at Tower Bridge- Break!

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre

First- the theatre! Though the Original Globe burned to the ground in 1613, this theatre is a pretty close replica on the exact same spot. Our tour guide- Annette- was amazing & gave a great low-down of the dirty, dark past.

Post Engagment: London, Hamburg, Frankfurt

The conclusion of the third day of London is long overdue, and the trip to central Germany hasn't even been addressed- so here it goes:

London: Day 1

Well, well, well... despite my fears of being flown into the House of Parliment in a terrorist attack, we've made it back safely to good ol' Berlin. I must admit, it's nice to get back to Berlin's grittiness. As far as our trip, we saw so much; therefore, we shall tell you of our adventures in London by the day.

We woke up bright and early Tuesday morning in Berlin, after a night of heavy cleaning (and a weekend of heavy drinking)... Our apartment mistress was coming back to reclaim her land for a few days, so we wanted to make it quite smashing for her (notice the English flair). We awoke in the early morning dawn and made our trek to Schönefeld Airport, where our RyanAir flight would soon be departing. We boarded the plane without any cavity searches (much to my disappointment) and were on our way to jolly ol' London Town!

After only and hour and twenty minutes, we landed at Stanstead Airport. After a brief inquisition into our reasons for visiting Britain, we were allowed to enter the country and boarded the Stanstead Express to London. Ebe kept looking for Platform Nine and Three Quarters, but I insisted we not spend one of our days at Hogwarts being made fun of for being muggels. Anyway, back to reality. The train ride into Liverpool Station lasted around 45 minutes, and we got to hear the lovely accents of the British people. It was weird not hearing German and took our ears a while to get acclimated to hearing English again... especially such silly English as what the Brits speak! Liverpool Station was beautiful, and Ebe and I were awestruck as we left the station and stepped into London's financial district. Buildings with old world charm stood next to shimmering sky scrapers; one of which was shaped like a huge pin cone! We decided on our way to the station that we would take a walking tour and try to see all of the big sites on our way to our hostel.

After leaving the financial district, we promptly entered the City of London. Back in the day this was London, which was surrounded by many other towns and villages (such as Westminister, Bloomsbury, and Southwark), which have today become part of London. The sidewalks were much smaller than any other city we've been in thus far, and the city itself much denser. We zig-zagged our way through the center and saw St. Paul's Cathedral rising in front of us. It was quite a site to behold. Thanks to some handy plaques, we learned that St. Paul's has the second highest free standing dome in the world, outside of the Vatican! Pretty impressive eh? We continued on our way to Covent Garden, which is a little "old" world shopping center. We were a little bummed to see that there wasn't a Christmas Market as we had expected, but it was still fun to see musicians playing the classics such as Handel and Mozart. We wandered around for a while, but it wasn't really quite our thing, plus we had to get to Piccadilly Circus to pick up our London Passes before the tourist office closed.

The closer we got to Piccadilly Circus, the more touristy the area became. On every corner were souvenir stands and McD's, with even a few Starbucks scattered here and there. The square itself at Piccadilly's is kind of comparable to Times Square in New York we've heard, so try to imagine that with a little English flair and not the huge skyscrapers. We picked up our London Passes, went to a British supermarket named Temco, and proceeded to a little park named St. James's Square, where we had a tasty sandwich with cheddar cheese (finally some cheddar) and ham. After looking at the map, we realized we weren't too far from Buckingham Palace, so we decided to drop in on the old broad. After walking up to the gate, we realized we couldn't just walk in and say hello, as there were soldiers standing guard outside the gate... along with some policemen with badass guns. Now you may be thinking that the guards here are the ones you always see on TV and in the movies, who are wearing red uniforms with the huge black hats that make them look like a giant's q-tip, but unfortunately they were dressed in more "present day" garb. After watching them "walk up and down the square," we told the Queen bye bye and headed to Westminister Abbey and the Houses of Parliment.

We walked through St. James's Park on the way there, and saw some cool things: some boxers sparing one another, crazy squirrels, and geese that were more curious than George! Westminister Abbey was quite a site to behold, but just beyond it stood Big Ben, which I think took a little bit away from the Abbey's splendor. Big Ben is part of a huge building of the Houses of Parliment. It's a grandiose building with beautiful architecture. Probably my favorite site in the city. It was really neat being next to Big Ben thinking that years ago Peter Pan flew by with the Darling children on their way to Never Neverland. Needless to say, we took a few pictures and headed over the Thames toward our hostel in Kennington.

After many wrong turns, and seeing a little street fight, we finally made it to our hostel. We caught our breath, put our junk away, and headed out to an English pub for some tasty British ales. We found a neat little local place not too far from our hostel and grabbed a pint. We sat down next to a charming man with a lovely mullet and continued to watch soccer with the patrons of the bar. After many "bloody hells" and "fuck offs" yelled at the TV screens, Mr. Sandman was coming to collect his dues. We said "cheerio" to this lovely crew and headed back to the hostel to catch some much needed Z's.

Coming up... Will Ebe and Ian get lost in the maze of the Tube? Or will they get caught up in a good ol' English hooligan soccer riot?  Maybe they'll even unfoil the plot of the British dental epidemic...

 London: Day 2 ( ebe gets the surprise of her life)
London: Day 3
London 2011
All UK posts