hollowsolid: November 2016

It began with a newspaper clipping for this show being innocently pinned to the notice board in the kitchen. When someone realised the final days of the show coincided with mid-term break AND Halloween, the discovery of the existence of Harry Potter World was all it took for all hell to break slowly loose on reservation websites across greater London. Aer Lingus Over. Ryanair Back (a mistake that will not be repeated). Wholefoods in between.

D's favourite from the show

We spent Sunday at the final day of the fantastic Georgia O'Keefe exhibition in the Tate. Georgia has a few new fans. We then took a cab to hunt down the meticulously researched best weekday gnocchi in London but were gutted to discover that the best weekday gnocchi in London is so good that it takes Sundays off. We did still manage to eat a fantastic lunch and dessert in a fine dining room so we left far from disappointed. Then it was off to the Royal Academy just around the corner to see Pollock, Rothko, De Kooning and friends go BIG with drips, splashes and rectangles. Great day and the whole trip would have been worth the effort for the paintings alone.

S at her happiest, in a cab, not walking

Heads Up

The London Eye, with punkins

Somewhere On The Southbank

Somewhere Else On The Southbank

Wicket

Rinky Dink Treat Me a-Nice-a, Treat Me a-Good-a

Georgia during her lesser known but no less lovely Barn period

Artists In Waiting

Rectangles

Drips

Getting herself caught up on Abstract Expressionism

Keep smiling, keep shining, Knowing you can always count on me, for sure

Georgia

Monday was Halloween and the weather was incredible for late October. We decided to upsticks out of the city proper and head to Camden Town for Pizza Picnic in the Park Part Two on Primrose Hill.

Camden Town

Primrose Hill

Had a lot of fun (For Sho') senaydying through sunny Camden Town teaching this girl a song she'd never heard before (and which I haven't heard in years)

Rothko

Tshirts in the park - on Halloween!

Cheating at Trick Or Treating

Then it was back to the hotel where, after dark, the girls went trick or treating. Indoors. Hotels have all the advantages of any densely populated area but without the usual festive hazards like misdirected fireworks, terrified animals roaming free, unkempt shrubbery to navigate in the dark, or hordes of advance parties of similarly minded competition plundering the spoils. The girls had one of their most lucrative Halloweens ever with their new approach. Room 270 was particularly bountiful. We finished up our Halloween evening attending a spellbinding performance of Wicked the musical - literally a last minute decision which turned out to be one of the highlights of the trip.

Wicked In Waiting

The next to final leg of our journey to Toughers Before Breakfast

Tuesday was a crazy day. Even 2 months in advance, Harry Potter World was completely booked out on Halloween, so it meant we had to book for the day of our flight home. Harry Potter World is approximately as convenient to get to from central London as Tougher's Restaurant is from Tullamore, before breakfast. We embarked on our mission at 7am (with our full luggage) across Westminster Bridge, took 2 tubes, jumped on an inter-city train at Euston Station and waited at a bus stop in the cold in Watford for a shuttle which didn't come. Which meant we finished our epic journey in a cab driven by a man who unashamedly told us that Harry Potter was "not my piece of cake". Not sure how we managed to get there for just after 9am but we did and what a day we had. Even I was excited by the time the two storey high doors of the great hall swung open to begin our tour.