Sushi in the Park

We left the house today without much of a plan except to try to spend the day outside, since today is supposed to be the last springlike day before a short cold spell begins tomorrow, with sleet showers forecast for two days next week. For now, we put that foreboding news out of our heads and enjoyed the warm sunshine, popping into the newly opened Seoul Bakery (we saw them painting the sign the last time we were in the neighbourhood) for sweet-red-bean-filled treats to eat while we walked.

Coffee followed, at a shop that we'd not yet visited, Algerian Coffee Stores. In the same location for 120 years, and currently the purveyors of what must be the cheapest cappuccino in town, we thought we'd give their bargain a try. "It'll be hard to top yesterday's coffee," Bob said, but Algerian Coffee Stores at least tied with their wonderful cappuccinos, losing points for the lack of seating, but gaining points for being half the price of other, lesser cappuccinos. Even though we had already had our dessert and coffee, after walking a bit more we realized that a bit of lunch was in order, and since we wanted to head to a nearby Japanese grocery store to restock on essentials, we decided to give their bargain sushi-counter a try. Now if you happen to be unfamiliar with our sushi obsession, well, let's just say that it's been quite the test for us to go sushi-less thus far in London. Vancouverites are positively spoiled when it comes to sushi, in terms of quality, selection, and price, and such luxuries have meant that we've been unable to bring ourselves to pay astronomical prices for what looks like really unremarkable sushi here in London. Of course, we knew what London sushi prices would be like, and I did my best to prepare by eating sushi every day during our last week in Vancouver (I'm not kidding). Anyway, today's sushi lunch was good enough for a small picnic in St. James's Park, but somehow it made us miss Vancouver sushi even more. At least St. James's Park was beautiful, as always, and we even saw something that we've never seen before:
The black swans were incredible with their red beaks and tiny flashes of white under their wings-- truly remarkable. We were surprised that the cygnets looked the same as white-swan cygnets, but I suppose all that dramatic colour takes time to develop. Moving from St. James's Park to Green Park, we came across the Canadian War Memorial,
which was quite lovely in the sunshine, with the water flowing across the leaves.
After some more walking and a bit of a bus ride, we continued our wandering through a different park in west London, Holland Park. Yet another great London greenspace, we took in quite a variety of sights in the park: outdoor sculpture in very groomed gardens,
two pairs of peacocks, complete with their startling cries,
a Japanese garden,

fields of daffodils in more random gardens,
and a unique take on the standard sundial.

We didn't get around to seeing half the things in the park, but definitely slated it for a return visit!