Exploring Greenwich Village and Market

Usually when we visit the lovely borough of Greenwich we get the DLR, the overground railway from the city where you can pretend you're driving the train. 

When we visited a few weeks ago, we decided to get up slightly earlier and get the Thames Clipper from Embankment Pier all the way down the Thames to Greenwich.

During Summer if you want to visit anywhere touristy in London, you have to get up early to beat the crowds, so we found ourselves at Embankment bright and early and all ready for the first Clipper of the day.

Walking the Thames Path from Richmond to Twickenham

It's hard to think of a nicer way to spend a sunny Sunday than with a walk along a section of the Thames Path. The full Path goes for 180 miles along the banks of the Thames, starting from the Thames Barrier out past Greenwich all the way out to Kemble in Gloucestershire.

We have done a few sections of the path before, in Greenwich, along the Southbank and in various sections between Putney and Richmond. Although they're all along the same river, each section is always unique with lots of different things to see.

We started in Richmond Village on Sunday morning and wandered along the high road, stopping to look in a few shops on the way, before arriving at the river.

The section we had chosen runs from Richmond, through some very rural looking countryside before ending up in Twickenham.

Richmond Riverside

Borough, Maltby and Spitalfields - Visiting London's Best Markets

One of our favourite things about London, is the wide variety of Markets dotted around the City. A lot of our weekends are spent getting up early and exploring at least one market, whether it be a farmer's market, like Borough Market in London Bridge, or a clothing market like Spitalfields in the City, we love getting out and discovering new things.

Both of these markets were on our list of places to take Wendy, so one Saturday morning we got up super early and headed into London Bridge to visit Borough Market before the rest of London woke up.

We got off the tube at Mansion House and walked across Southwark Bridge and along the Southbank.

Looking back towards Southwark Bridge and St Paul's

A Summer afternoon in Hampstead Heath

In August, Bradley's Mum Wendy stopped in to visit us for a few weeks while en route to start a new life teaching in Amman, Jordan.

She was lucky (or not) to visit London during a heat wave, when daily temperatures were up to 32 degrees Celsius.

We had a few things planned for her visit, we made a list of our favourite places in London, with a few of the Big Tourist attractions, but also some lesser known spots on the London tourist trail. 

In general, London is insanely packed full of tourists in August, and we try to avoid crowds as much as possible. So we've become well acquainted with London's back streets and which tube stations are quieter and which ones are easiest to change tube lines.

While Wendy used to live in London when she was younger, it's still a shock arriving in London, where the population in just this one city, is twice the population of the entire country of New Zealand.

With this in mind, we spent our first Sunday all together exploring Hampstead Heath, a rambling park just a few stops from the City of London, and covering 320 hectares of land.

Breakfast in the clouds at Duck and Waffle

Last weekend we woke up very early for a Saturday and headed into the City to try out breakfast at Duck and Waffle. The restaurant opened about a year ago on the 40th Floor of the Heron Tower, and it has amazing views over East London, all the way to the Olympic Stadium, and also out over the City towards the Southbank and St Paul's.

Duck and Waffle is open 24 hours a day, but if you want to visit at more sociable hours, then depending on what time you want to visit, you may have to book a few weeks in advance.

Turns out breakfast is a quiet time to visit, especially before 10.00 a.m., so we got a booking on a Saturday morning only a few days in advance.

Afternoon Tea in a Secret Garden in the New Forest

After another huge breakfast of granola and blueberry pancakes, we hopped back on our bikes to return them to the Cycle hire company. If it was at all possible, I had managed to forget everything I had learnt about cycling from the previous day, and fell into about four fences in the 10 minute cycle from Daisybank B&B to the train station.

Luckily we were returning the bikes, and not doing any more cycling, otherwise I might have been in some trouble.

Cycling around the New Forest - from Brockenhurst to Beaulieu

We woke up on Sunday morning to grey skies and drizzly rain. Considering our plan for the day was hiring Bicycles and exploring the New Forest by bike, this was not a great start.

We had a huge breakfast of granola and yoghurt, plus blueberry pancakes, and headed out into the rain. While it was only raining lightly, it was a steady rainfall that didn't seem to be stopping as we got closer to the bike rental.

We had a moment of 'Should We' Shouldn't We' and decided to continue with our plan and hope the rain stopped soon. Luckily we chose right and just as we hopped on our bikes the rain cleared up.

Having only had one rather disastrous experience three years previously in San Francisco, I was understandably a bit nervous about trying cycling again. It took me a good 10 minutes to remember how to ride a bike before we were off and cycling down the road towards Beaulieu (pronounced Bew-lee).

Luckily the roads around the New Forest are quite quiet, and full of drivers who are used to driving slowly for fear of a pony running into the road, but it was still a bit scary riding on the road for the first time with cars. 

A long weekend in the New Forest

For the last Bank Holiday until Christmas, we headed an hour and a half South West of London to The New Forest, a huge National Park that was a former hunting round of William the Conqueror.

Contrary to its name, there isn't too much forest to be found, the area is made of up large pastures and open spaces, interspersed with patches of woodland. The New Forest is made up of Common Land, land that is owned collectively or by one person, but where other people also have rights to graze their cattle and livestock.

When the New Forest was created, it came under strict laws, put into place to protect the natural wildlife, such as deer, boar and ponies and all the surrounding vegetation. This meant that there was always of meat for the Royal Family, and also provided a huge area for hunting. 

It also meant that no-one can interfere with the wildlife, meaning ponies had, and still have, free reign over the Forest. They are everywhere, though you're not allowed to pat them as otherwise they will become too used to humans and start being naughty, like approaching humans for food, which can make them sick.

We left London on Friday afternoon and found ourselves in Brockenhurst, in the heart of the New Forest by the early evening.