A Capital Day Out by Aileen Cleave

 


A Capital Day Out


Everyone loves an outing, an excursion, a brief escape from the humdrum routine of everyday life.  For me, the  ultimate day out is a city day, and in particular, a London day.  I live my life deep in the Spanish countryside now, and I love it, I really appreciate the peace and the tranquility.  After 30 years of working in the centre of London, this campo life is nothing short of magical.  

However, any opportunity I get to spend a few days meandering through city streets, re-discovering favourite shops, restaurants, theatres, I jump at it.  And Spain is truly blessed with its choice of cities. Almeria, Malaga, Granada, Saville, all beautiful cities steeped in history and we’ve barely left the province yet.  Now this is not the season nor the weather  to wax lyrical about perusing through Spanish city streets, that’s best done in the kinder months of October or November, but we are coming up to the time of year when my husband and I wend our way up through the length of Spain to arrive at the ferry port of Bilbao and cross over to England for a month’s respite from the heat. And one of the things I most look forward to on these occasions is a day out in London with my two daughters.

The one i recall most fondly is from several years ago.  I hadn’t been back to the UK for a year or two, probably because of  Covid, and I was straining at the bit to be let loose in London.  The day dawned warm and sunny.  We started our journey at a station in Kent, and for me even this was exciting, travelling as we were outside commuter time.  Although I had commuted to London daily for years, there is a whole different feel to mid morning travel.  Reminds me of when I was allowed to take the day off school for whatever reason, the unnatural quiet everywhere, laced with vague feelings of guilt.  We had theatre tickets for the evening but the hours before were all our own to shop, wander, eat and imbibe at will. 

We headed for Marylebone, always a favourite London ‘village’ of mine, to have coffee at La Fromagerie, which stocks the best cheeses this side of the channel.  Refreshed, we headed back out to Marylebone High Street with its fascinating selection of shops, all way above our price range of course, except for the charity shops.  And here, Vinted lovers, are the highest quality charity shops anywhere in the country. We had a field day!  Weighed down with Chanel and  Dior carrier bags (second hand, of course) we headed out to look for lunch.  We had wandered into Chiltern Street and my eye was caught by a beautiful Georgian building with a huge display window sporting ice trays of  oysters.  This was the famous Chiltern FireHouse, much loved by stars and royalty, and impossible to get a table for months ahead.  (I believe it’s temporarily closed at the minute, following a fire earlier in the year).  We were feeling on top of the world, so without thinking twice, I went inside and asked if there was a possibility they could find a table for us.  We were rewarded with a table for 1 hour and 15 minutes which, given that we couldn’t afford to eat too much, was perfect.  The girls each had an Aperol spritzer and I had a margarita, so that was most of our lunch budget gone, but we were so enjoying the entire experience, I ordered half a dozen oysters and they had eggs Benedict - we had, after all, shopped in a Sue Ryder charity shop!

Next came our culture spot.  We were virtually on the doorstep of the Wallace Collection so that’s where we went to improve our minds a tad.   It is a museum well worth a visit, housing amongst many others The Laughing Cavalier and Velazquez’s  Lady with a Fan.  It also has a delightful conservatory serving afternoon teas.

After that there was only the short walk back to Shaftsbury Avenue to find a pavement table, enjoy a pre-theatre glass of wine and watch more people pass by than I see in a month here in Arboleas.  When we finally made ourselves comfortable on  the last train home out of Charing Cross (an experience in itself!) it was with a feeling of a day well spent, a truly capital day out.


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