Sunday, 10th August, 2008
10 August, also known as Charity Shield Day!! The match was at 3pm so we had a whole morning to walk about leisurely.
In our excitement to get out, we had forgotten the most important thing.. the tickets! Thank goodness he remembered before we reached the tube station, and ran back to get them. We were on our way to Kensington station to meet Chye for breakfast.
So he bought his 2 pounds news paper (sgd$5+) just because it had some charity shield news. So we were on this train and as we reached St James Station, Chye called and we find out that he has just woken up and cannot meet us for breakfast. Yes, very lousy. But never mind. pb says St James Park has a football stadium (See why pb wants to come to London?) and so we alighted.
Worst sandwich I've ever tasted. Some ham thing and mustard. BLech.
Ok, turns out the football stadium he was referring to, is not here, but in Newcastle. Anyhow smoke me. But, it is a nice park!
Haven't seen squirrels in a long time. Dont we miss the furry critters!
We walked a bit more and reached Westminster Abbey. Pancakes!!!
Ham, cheese and mushroom. Plus chiobu.
London Eye
Big Ben
Lu bian tan! Too bad these yummy looking hotdogs and onions are sold in Pounds
Walked over to the London Eye area.. and there was a Dali exhibit
Considered going up the Eye.. Actually we did wanna do that, but the queue was soo long that we decided against it.
Enjoyed the atmosphere along the eye. Lots of buskers doing crazy things
This guy lagi best. Just cycle like crazy when anyone throws him some $.
engrossed in his football news by the River Thames.
Next, we walked over to Whitehall road. London is a super walkable city, most of the important sights can be reached by walking.
bmw police cars
horseguard
this heavily barricaded area is the entrance (or backdoor?) of Downing Street. 10 Downing street is where the Prime Minister stays.. The place looks like a construction site though, and everyone is just peering through the gates, although we can't really see anything.
Walked towards Trafalgar Square
bought some souvenirs
And it was time for lunch at a traditional (so we think) English pub!
fantastic beer
steak and kidney pie
The food was alright, though it did feel a little queasy eating food that looks like dog food. Then again, dog food does look quite good to me. Especially those bacon treat things. Hah.
Finally it was time to set off towards Wembley Stadium!
Trains were crowded. As we got off our train at Baker Street station to change trains, there were already security personnel guiding us to the right trains. And when we got off at Wembley Park, we could hear fans shouting and cheering in the train station already!
The atmosphere was fantastic!
Make sure you go by the right bridge..
priceless
these guys were jeering the other team's fans across this barricade, while the neon policemen on horses looked on, ready to stop any fights.
I'm not quite sure how they do their job.. Isn't it kinda cumbersome to be riding a horse? Didn't get to see them in action.. I suppose they just kinda oversee stuff cos they're higher up there.
lots of security everywhere!
We had to hold this up in the beginning.. to form the word 'Respect'. Otherwise it served as a good clapper/noisemaker thing.
We had pretty awesome seats! Even though it was behind the goal [kena cheated, the description said along the side], it was damn near and we could almost see their facial expressions. =) Oh, our seats were also not together (there was one guy in between us) but luckily we managed to displace him to the side so that we could sit together. Whew, luckily our seats were near each other's.
This guy keeps standing up to lead everyone in cheer.. And everyone stands up whenever anything becomes exciting. Kinda irritating cos then I would have to stand up too. Too bad we didn't really know the chants and songs, or we would have loved to join in!
this guy chao geng!
ok, i think van der sar is very friendly. Cos he's quite near us, he always waves and says hi!
this guy fell asleep!! Check out the orange security guy behind laughing at him. It was hilarious. I guess that's what beer does to you. That guy was hauled out later by the security guards.
Not over yet. There was still a long long way to reach our train cos of the number of people. But we truly enjoyed our first (and probably last?) live football match.. The people there really made it loads of fun for us, and this is definitely one of the highlights of our whole trip. =)
Tubed to Picadilly Circus [where there were still guys in red/blue shouting/singing], and had dinner at Garfunkels.
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