Our last month on this side of the pond has been busy. The first weekend I went to Michigan for my family Christmas and Leanne stayed in London.
On Saturday she would watch the Champions tennis at the Royal Albert hall (of course Don purchased the tix for me).
This is the same place we watched the children's choir a few weeks ago.
The first match was Ferrero v Santoro
And the second was a doubles match with
Bahrami/Ferreira v Philippoussis/Pernfors
That evening she went to the The Madison https://www.madisonlondon.net/ for her retirement party.
The venue has a fantastic roof top bar with a view of St. Paul's. She had a wonderful time and was amazed at how beautiful it was.
At my family Christmas this year's theme was Tailgate Christmas, so Heather, Lisa and my brother Jim's girls were cheerleaders.
Dayton was wearing my old football jersey.
We celebrated with the cousins pyramid.
And a new tradition of the grand kids pyramid.
We even had Santa show up to pass out gifts.
Some of the gifts were different but were greatly appreciated.
One of the things we do is make homemade polish kielbasa.
From the cutting,
to the stuffing.
My sister Mary started a new tradition of making an apple pie like my mother used to make.
The following weekend we went to High Tea at the Hotel cafe Royal https://www.hotelcaferoyal.com/afternoontea
This was on our to-do list before we left London.
As you can see it was very elegant and delicious.
I had a good time and I don't even like tea.
Leanne's co-workers wanted to have one more night out with us. They took us to the Ginstitute for a gin class. https://www.portobelloroadgin.com/the-ginstitute/
The event was on Portobello road a short ride from our house. In the class the instructor explained how gin is made and
how they add different flavors to change the taste of the gin. This picture shows a small amount of the flavors that can be added.
After explaining all of this we were able to make our own bottle of gin.
The excitement built to see who's formulations would be the best.
We tried everyone's bottle and some were OK and some were bad
some were really bad.
As the tasting continued the instructor would give the pros and cons of each bottle. My bottle was not one of the better ones.
In the end the winner for the best tasting Gin was Leanne's bottle.
After the tastings Leanne's co-workers gave her a scarf for a going away present.
They also gave her a framed memento of her time with the team.
So now we have four bottles of gin from the event. The two that we made and two more for taking the class. Leanne also received another bottle from one of her co workers. So we have about 3 more weeks in London and five bottles of gin to drink along with our other bottles of booze. We will have to see if we can ship them back.
As we start the process of heading back to the U.S. we have to get the shipping crate out of the closet for Coach and 25. As you can see Coach is not excited about us getting the the crate out, 25 on the other hand could care less.
This is our last fox sighting in London, Coach wanted to "play" with it.
For 25 staring at the lights on the Christmas tree is how she plays.
Time to get rid of some alcohol. We had about two shots of tequila left in a bottle, Leanne was game to have one.
It was chilled in the freezer so its going to go down with out a problem.
Then again maybe not.
One of the things I did while we were here is to make things for Leanne to take to work. They were mostly sweet things, but every once in a while I would make buffalo chicken pizza. One of her crew challenged me to make something with ingredients she sent home with Leanne. I passed the test. The last thing I made was Heath bars made from crackers she sent. They had never had Heath bars so they were a big hit.
The end of the month we did a river cruise. Starting in Vienna with stops in Budapest Hungry, Bratislava, Slovakia and then back to Vienna. As we were walking to our boat we passed this building. I think they forgot to put spaces in the name of this place.
As we neared the river we thought we saw our boat---not this one.
This is our boat. Not a bad place to stay for the next few days.
After we checked in we walked around the ship, and walked into this room.
I called this the Eleanor wing of the boat. The three painting looked like the one's my mom did when she went to Florida in the winter.
The boat left Vienna late in the afternoon and headed for Budapest. On the way we would have dinner have a few drinks before settling in for the night.
When morning arrived we were in Hungry. We had signed up to do a tour of the city and after breakfast we were off.
The first stop was Hősök tere or Heroes' Square
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hősök_tere
It's one of the major squares in Budapest, Hungary, noted for its iconic statue complex featuring the Seven chieftains of the Magyars and other important Hungarian national leaders. One of the leaders King Coloman, prohibited the burning of witches. I think the witch guild paid for his statue.
Next to Heroes's square was Vajdahunyad Castle,
http://www.vajdahunyadcastle.com/
An impressing looking place that is only 100 years old. It was built on 1000th birthday of the Hungarian State in 1896 for the Millennial Exhibition. We went to watch the people skate.
After getting back on the bus we headed to the the other side to the river to Buda Castle,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buda_Castle.
At one time it was the palace of the kings. It now the national gallery and history museum.
From there we went to a small square to see Matthias church,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthias_Church
From the back side of the church we were able to see the Hungarian Parliament building,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_Parliament_Building
Budapest is actually two city's, Buda on one side of the river and Pest on the other. The Parliament building is on the Pest side of the river. Can you tell it was cold that day?
From our view we could see the back side of the church. I thought the detail of the tiled roof was amazing.
Doing a street walk, notice that the streets and sidewalks are wet. For some reason they like to use slippery stones to walk on.
Leanne checking out the happy crap at the Christmas market.
Most of it was overpriced not worth buying.
This was an indoor market that sold produce and meats and some clothes. This looked like a great place to shop if you lived here. It had every thing you needed, kind of like Walmart with out the silly dressed people.
A view of the boat as we headed back to it. It would be leaving at a designated time weather you were on it or not. We made sure we got back at the right time.
As we left we got better view of the Parliament building.
As with most cruise meals the food was fantastic. The meals were cooked in conjunction with the country you were in.
The lunch and dinner meals were four to six course.
The desserts were always interesting.
There were a few locks we had to go thru, in this one the ship would drop about 30 feet.
Leanne enjoying some reading time, as I watch the world go by.
Our next town/country was Bratislava, Slovakia. Another bus tour city our first stop would be the Bratislava Castle that is high on the hill.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bratislava_Castle
From the castle we had views of the town and across the river. The bridge in the foreground is called Most SNP commonly referred to as Most Slovenského národného povstania or the UFO Bridge
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most_SNP
The tower on the far side of the bridge has a flying saucer shaped structure at the top. This has a restaurant and observation deck.
This town also had a Christmas market, we did not buy any thing.
Back on the ship and it's time to eat again. Each fork and spoon is another course, tonight is just four course's
First course was Bloc of duck Foie Gras de Canard
The second course was Rack of veal with shallots and tarragon. It must have been very good because I ate it before taking a picture.
The third course was Gradma style Reblochon Puff Pastry
Reblochon is a type of french cheese. Reblochon derives from the word "reblocher" which when literally translated means "to pinch a cow's udder again". This refers to the practice of holding back some of the milk from the first milking. During the 14th century, the landowners would tax the mountain farmers according to the amount of milk their herds produced. The farmers would therefore not fully milk the cows until after the landowner had measured the yield. The milk that remains is much richer, and was traditionally used by the dairymaids to make their own cheese.
This cheese cannot be bought in the U.S.
The last course was Baked Alaska flamed with Grand Marnier.
We arrived back in Vienna the next morning, it was wonderful trip.
Leanne had one more week of work after our river cruise. On her last day
I went to her office to help bring a few boxes of stuff home. She will miss the view along with her team.
A few days later we had long lunch with two of her closest team members. After we had a nice long walk to the tube station. enjoying our last day in this part of London.
As we got closer to St. Paul's Leanne said we were close to where her retirement party was. A few turns and we were able to find it.
We had a drink and reminisced about our stay on this side of the pond.
The last week in London was spent doing a lot of different things. The shipping company came one day and packed everything up. Our dog walker. Ria would come one day and take thing we couldn't use in the U.S. Any food and electrical stuff, like the vacuum, blender and crock pot. We would still be in the house a few days after everything was gone. Our stuff was gone but the house was furnished so we still had a bed. Being we had now way to cook we ate out, and stopped at the local pub for a pint or two.
For our last day in London we did a walk from the house to Buckingham Palace. The walk would take us thru Kensington garden, Hyde park, Green park and St. James park. Coach was off his leash the whole distance except for the road crossings. Here he is in front of Buckingham Palace walking on the Queens front lawn.
Hey look the Queen!!
Our last visit and she still didn't invite us in.
Coach saying good by the the horses.
"Cheers"
Only the finest glasses for our last drink in the house.
