Things to do in London #5 - The Victoria and Albert Museum

The Victoria and Albert Museum, or the V&A as every self respecting Londoner would call it, is an amazing Museum. It was always my favourite as a child as they had a great costume gallery. Sadly when we visited the costume gallery was closed for refurbishment. But I was blown away by some of the new exhibits that have been re done. The jewellery was a knock out, both in the content and the display. You were not allowed to take any photographs due to value of the collection so here is a picture off their website.

There was also a collection of miniature mosaics, with the pieces being so small that they looked like paintings and an exhibit of design through the 20th century which was fascinating. This is all housed in a very large Victorian building, some of which has be restored and some like the jewellery exhibit has been updated.  The V & A is situated by the South Kensington Tube station and just down the road from Harrods in Knightsbridge. The building is set around a courtyard with a large pond and some grass which had it been a warmer day would have been nice to sit out in.

The cafe at the V&A is also spectacular it is located in the V&A's original refreshment rooms, these three rooms formed the first museum restaurant in the world and were intended as a showpiece of modern design, craftsmanship and manufacturing. They are absolutely stunning, each one being very different  we had to have lunch there.

Things to do in London #4 - The National Portrait Gallery

One of the best kept secrets in London is the National Portrait Gallery. Everyone knows the National Gallery which is wonderful and I visit almost every time I go to London, but the Portrait gallery is smaller and more intimate. It has a great collection of paintings and photographs documenting famous British people from the past as well as the present.

The ground floor has the most contemporary works of such people as Judy Dench, Princes William and Harry, and Lily Allen.  Every time I go there are always some new ones.  They also have special exhibits which unlike the rest of the gallery you have to pay for.

On the 2nd and 3rd floors they have everything from some wonderful portraits of Queen Elizabeth I and Henry 8th to a tiny sketch which is the only known drawing of Jane Austen.

Restaurant at National Gallery restaurant

But one of the best things at the National Portrait gallery is the restaurant which is on the 4th floor and has the most wonderful views over Trafalgar square and across the Thames.  You feel as you are almost at eye level to Nelson standing on his column, except he has his back to you.

I have wanted to go to lunch here for years, but usually I go visit the gallery on my own and this was something I wanted to share.  So this time I had two of my best friends from Canada with me so I took them up the long escalator and stairs to the top for lunch. 

The amazing view

Lucca

Lucca is a small walled town between Florence and Pisa.  We were flying out of Pisa, but not until late in the evening so we decided to take a train to Lucca, maybe cycle around as that was highly recommended and then continue on to Pisa in time to see the leaning tower then fly back to London.

Well as Robert Burns wrote "the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry", and these ones certainly did.  All started well, we got the bus to the train station and managed to catch the appropriate and very cheap train to Lucca.  The trip took about 1 hour as it stopped quite a few times.  Then things derailed, Connie had been assured by one of her trusty guide books that there was a place that you could leave your luggage and rent a bike right by the train station.

One of the beautiful squares in Lucca

There was no luggage drop to be found so we headed dragging our bags behind us through the large city walls.  I asked a policeman if he knew of a place, and my Italian was nonexistent, and his English not much better, so he directed us back where we came from and we tried again at the train station.

Still no luck, so now starting to get hot and tired of dragging our luggage around, we headed back through the walls.  This time we asked a bicycle rental shop who suggested we tried the bus station, the route he sent us on, was up on the wall surrounding the town and back down about a 1/4 the way round.   This was the low point, and there are no pictures of this very picteresque walk as no one was in the mood to take pictures.  Fortunately by the bus station there was somewhere to leave our luggage (for about double the price of the train!).  All thoughts of cycling had left my head, I wanted to find a restaurant in a shady spot for a cold drink and something to eat.

Nancy enjoying a cool beer after the route march

We found the perfect little spot and ordered beer and prosseco, cooled off and relaxed. We ordered two pizzas and two salads to share.

pizza with mozzerela, mushrooms, arrugala and parmazan

Last night in Florence Alfredo's

Alfredo's was a restaurant also very close to our apartment and recommended both by the owner and a couple of books, so we went there for dinner on our last night in Florence.

Again most of the diners were Italian and it was not too busy when we arrived but more people kept coming in, and obviously a lot of them were regulars and seemed to know the people working there.

For a starter I wanted to try ribollita, a traditional Tuscan soup that has bread as a main ingredient, I wanted to try it as I had never had it before.  Of course this was a bit of a waste as I still could not taste.

It really did not photograph well, but actually it was good and hearty, I can imagine this would be much more popular in the winter.  Some recipes I have seen talk about bean soup with croutons in it.  The bread was much more than croutons it was the main ingredient.  Texturally it was good and the others tell me it tasted good aswell.

San Lorenzo Market - Florence's Central Market

My original vision had been to go to the market and buy food to cook back up at the apartment, well the timing was off, and sometimes you have to change the vision to meet the reality.  So we went to the Central market for lunch instead, not a bad thing.

Around the central food market there are several streets of vendors selling leather goods, scarves and all kinds of jewellery and other touristy items.

I really wish I had bought this umbrella, it was the only one I saw and what a perfect souvenir for someone who lives in a rain forest.

We poked around the stalls bought a few scarves, belts, bags and wallets as presents for family at home and then headed in to the food market.

There was of course every kind of pasta that you have ever seen, olives and vegetables.

Beautiful zucchini flowers

A visit to a winery - Castello Verrazzano

While we were in Florence we wanted see some of Tuscan countryside and also to visit a winery, so we were delighted when our waiter one lunch time gave us a brochure for a winery and informed us that in fact we could be picked up and taken there. the winery was Castello Verrazzano.

It turned out this was the same family that the bridge in New York is named after, in fact they contended that it should not have been called the Hudson River it should have been called The Verrazzano river as apparently he was there first.

Castello Verrazzano

We phoned the number provided in the brochure to request the executive wine tour, which included picking us up, tour of the winery lunch with tasting and bringing us back to Florence. Unfortunately we wanted to go on Monday and they did not do the executive tour that day, but the woman we were talking to said that she came right by our apartment every day on her way to work and she would pick us up and take us there, and then drop us off at the bus to get back.  We jumped at the chance and for 28.00 euros each we would get a "light lunch" and the tour and tasting.

Gillian (an expat who had married an Italian) picked us up as arranged at 9:30 and drove us through the beautiful countryside to the winery.  She was very informative and told us a little about the winery and a lot about living in Italy.

The winery itself is beautiful, built on a hill top with several levels of buildings including the family home. We were a little early for the tour, so we hung out taking hundreds of pictures of the beautiful scenery.

Part of the gardens

Cantinetta dei Verrazzano

We were looking for lunch one day and the foccacia breads in the window  Cantinetta dei Verazzano drew us in.

We were greeted by an exuberant waiter who spoke English with a slight American accent. It turned out his father was American, but he was born and brought up in Italy.  He was a big sports fan and was cheering for the Boston Bruins to win the Stanley Cup, we tried not to hold this against him.

The inside of the restaurant

Our waiter said he would bring us a selection of different breads and sandwiches, so we put our trust in him and his choice of wine.

We received a platter of cut up sandwiches and foccacia breads my only complaint was that they were cut in to 3's and there was 4 of us so dividing was a little difficult.  I think we all agreed that our favourites were the zucchini blossom foccacia and the pea sandwich.

Zucchini blossom foccaccia

The wine he brought was also good, none of us noticed that the wine had the same name as the restaurant, in fact this restaurant belonged to Castillo Verrazzano a very old winery in Tuscany.  So when we asked if he could recommend a winery for us to visit, of course he could and he gave us a pamphlet for the winery, and I am very glad he did.

Again for dessert he said to trust him again and he would bring a selection of tarts, I must say he was a very good salesman.

One plate of tarts

The second plate of tarts

We disagreed on our favourites here, I was definatly loving the chocolate, but they were all fine.  As I am writing this I realize I was still tasting at this point as it was on the first day in Florence, and I could taste even the very delicately flavoured zucchini flower foccacia.