After fabulous pastries in the cute café in Pimlico we skipped yesterday, we left London today. Our final hour in the Big Smoke was spent waiting at Waterloo station for a three hour train trip to Weymouth on the south coast.
Remembering my age old antipathy to London, a city I could not learn to love when I moved to work here in the early 1980s, I am pleased that I shall now miss this glorious place. I have enjoyed our time here. I like the city. We will be back.
But for now, we are on the move again; to a different sort of England. Weymouth on the English Riviera to spend a few days with Spike's grandmother.
At the beginning of the British summer all the painted Bed & Breakfast houses show "No Vacancy" signs. The town is full but who knows where the people are?
There is a high of 14° and a "brisk" northeasterly breeze. The pebble beach is empty. The wooden changing huts unused.
A turquoise English channel looks almost inviting and through the haze one can almost see the white chalk cliffs (over which there may or may not be blue birds flying).
Later, in our mediocre hotel (the ONLY location with a roll-in shower I could find in Weymouth anywhere near Spike's grannie) I opt for tradition. Fish n chips.
On a slim menu with next to zero non-meat options this is Hobson's Choice (the illusion that multiple choices are available when, of course, it's this or nothing). Whatever it may be, it's a bad choice. But if I'm honest, what did I think I would be getting other than oven chips and rubber haddock blitzed in a microwave?
It serves me right so stop your moaning, Douglas. Enjoy your holiday, you ungrateful wretch.
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