A journal, a dictionary and some toys

Before we set off for the day, I had a little adventure by venturing out to Boots the Chemist on my own. I had no trouble finding the shop in Tottenham Court Road but got quite confused on the way back and took the same wrong turn we took yesterday. Eventually I found Charing Cross Road and then couldn't manage to unlock the street door for our apartment. Luckily a young man arrived and let me in with his key instead. I expect you will be relieved to hear that I practised on our way home this afternoon and have it all worked out now (I hope!).

We used our Oyster Cards for the first time today on the Underground and found it very easy to touch on and touch off - similar to the Myki. We travelled on the Central line to Bank station and then walked to St Olave's church in Hart Street. In this church, which is dedicated to the patron saint of Norway, there are memorials to Samuel Pepys (the seventeenth century diarist) and his wife, Elizabeth.

  

As we entered, we were struck by the beauty of the church with its lovely stained glass windows, colourful memorials and harvest festival decorations. We spent quite a while there looking at everything and reading about the history of the church. It was thrilling actually to be in the church which Pepys wrote about in his Diary!     

St Olave's gate, referred to as 'Ghastly Grim Gate'
by Charles Dickens in 'The Uncommercial Traveller' 

From there we took quite a long walk west, to Gough Square off Fleet Street, to visit Dr Samuel Johnson's house. This National Trust property is the house in which Johnson was living when he compiled his famous dictionary. It is sparsely furnished but the notes in each room (from the kitchen in the basement to the garret on the fifth level) were fascinating, with anecdotes about the people Johnson associated with. There was also a video of an imaginary conversation between the ghosts of Johnson and his biographer, James Boswell, which was very informative and entertaining.

Samuel Johnson's house

A statue of Hodge, Johnson's cat

It was a short walk along Fleet Street to Prince Henry's Room, one of the few houses to survive from before  the 1666 Great Fire in London. The house is not open but we enjoyed taking some photos there.

Prince Henry's Room

Fleet street near Prince Henry's Room

Lunch was a quick stop at Pret a Manger, a place a bit like Nashi but with a huge choice of food - I had a salad of crayfish and avocado and Ian had a BBQ pulled pork hot wrap (with onion, corn and peppers).

We caught the Underground back to Tottenham Court Road and visited Pollock's Toy Museum on our way home. This is a great little museum, spread over two adjacent houses (one built in the 1880s and the other a century earlier). We wandered up and down stairs, through five rooms of toys with the earliest from the 1820s through to the 1970s. I especially enjoyed the collection of dolls and doll houses and Ian enjoyed seeing the construction toys (Meccano and Mini Brix) and the minature cars, trucks and trains.

Our first day in London ended with a lovely meal at home, cooked by Ian - beef Wellington and  bread and butter pudding - with a little help from Marks and Spencer.