Holiday blog day 1

You've probably been wondering why I haven't posted anything for a couple of days. Or not, as the case may be, but I'm going to tell you anyway.

I'm on holiday this week, so we decided that a trip down to Harpenden to see my Mum and Dad was in order. We had a nice easy drive down on Monday afternoon and were very grateful for the climate control in the Prius that kept us cool as the temperature outside nudged over 30 degrees as we headed south. I'm normally cautious about running the climate control, but we still averaged over 55Mpg whilst fully laden which is pretty good, I reckon.

Anyhoo, we arrived in time for a reviving glass of wine sat out on the patio under the vines of my Mum and Dad's pergola, and it felt all very continental with bats flitting around as the sun set. Bliss.

The plan for Tuesday was to head into London, culture for the viewing of, so we caught the train ...



... which got all of the way to St Albans before breaking down, requiring a quick change of trains before we got one that managed to get us all of the way to the very swish new St Pancras station - the first time that I have been there since it has been redeveloped. Very impressive. We also noticed some location shooting going on for a new series of Primeval, so watch out for a dino attack on the Eurostar terminus (maybe).



A quick tube journey followed, and then we headed over the Millennium foot bridge to Tate Modern, following the directions on my phone gps map thingy.



It was the first time that I had visited either of the Tate galleries, and my impressions were very favourable. There were some stunning exhibits on display, particularly Bacon's 'Second Triptych', Roy Lichenstein's iconic 'Whaaam!', Umberto Boccioni's
'Unique Forms of Continuity in Space' and an excellent video installation by Susan Hillier called 'Psi Girls'. Well worth a visit.

There wasn't an exhibit in the main Turbine hall, but it is still a fantastic space, and it reminded me of the scale of Magna in Sheffield. There was some building work going on outside, but the gallery pranksters had managed to turn it into an artwork as well ...



Next followed a quick boat trip up the Thames to allow us to do the tourist thang and gawk at various London landmarks from an aquatic perspective ...



The boat conveniently landed at Tate Britain which was next on the itinerary for the day. It was a very different environment, but still an excellent place to look at art. I was flagging at this point, so after looking at some more contemporary British art (including Tracey Emin's 'Hate and Power Can be a Terrible Thing') I may have closed my eyes in brief and deep contemplation of a video about Orientalism in British art. Ahem.

Where's Wally^W Neil?



Another hot and sweaty tube journey, a refreshing pint of Budvar in a bar on the station concourse and then back to Harpenden with a thankfully smooth and trouble free train journey.

Day 2 coming soon ...