One promised thing left over from last night’s birthday celebration. We went to Alan’s birthday dinner at Koffmann’s in the Berkeley Hotel. We walked there and it took us about 25 minutes. We had been told to plan on it taking an hour so we arrived a half an hour early. The restaurant staff was very courteous about it and seated us immediately. At 7:30 there were more staff than customers but by 8, our original time, the place was totally filled. We started with an amuse bouche of puff pastry and caramelized onions, then 5 types of bread. We split a cassoulette of escargot with parsley foam and a garlic aioli. Then Alan had an amazing duck with red cabbage and I had monk fish with ratatouille. No pictures of these but we did take a picture of our desserts–pistachio soufflé with pistachio ice cream for me, and for the birthday boy, a dark chocolate mousse and a glass of sweet wine. YUM! An amazing meal. We walked home, needless to say!

Today we had planned on going to Hampton Court Palace but didn’t wake up until almost 11 A.M. Jet lag finally caught up with us! We left the house by 1 P.M. and were going to go to Greenwich instead. Twenty steps down the road, Alan went back for our coats, gloves, etc. and we headed to the Imperial War Museum. I had been there but really wanted Alan to see it. When we got there, we found most of it was closed for refurbishing for the World War I centennial next year. The Holocaust exhibit was still open and I have always considered it one of the best I have ever seen, so we spent a couple of hours there. Apparently it poured while we were inside. The pictures are of Captain Bligh’s home which is directly across from the museum and of the museum which is housed in the old Bedlam Hospital! I always thought that was an amazing bit of trivia.


Around the corner from our local tube station, South Kensington, is an arcade with pastry shops, cheese shops, restaurants, and bunches of other shops. We stopped at Paul’s Bakery for tomorrow’s breakfast and then, having skipped lunch, stopped at Thai Square for dinner. It was excellent, well-spiced Thai food. We are really enjoying this neighborhood and highly recommend it!
Tomorrow we are determined to go to Greenwich and then probably straight from there, to Wembley Stadium for a World Cup soccer qualifying match between England and Montenegro. It should be a full and fun day!