Gifts from Paris

Our friend Paul flew in today from Paris, where he'd been studying French for two weeks (read: eating chocolate) as part of his vacation from normal life in Toronto; since his London stop would only be about 48 hours, Bob and I did our best to show him at least a bit of this enormous city. This was our first time playing London tour-guide for someone from Canada, and it was very difficult to decide what to do. Paul's list of want-to-dos was very short (British Museum, Tate Modern, a pub, some good food, lots of walking), which helped, but a day and a half of non-sleeping time in London is still bound to be a blur of activity. Anyway, we started out at the UpMarket for a very late lunch and a bit of East-End-London Sunday-afternoon atmosphere, before heading west to Covent Garden and Soho for a slow stroll, during which we came across more of The Grand Tour reproductions

and a plaque marking Canaletto's residence, which was especially nice since Bob and I had really enjoyed the wonderful exhibit of his London paintings at the Dulwich Picture Gallery back in February. Next up was a peek at village-y London life, in the form of Hampstead. We wandered through the streets near the heath,
coming across a plaque for George du Maurier,
as well as mansions, show dogs (a whole series of them, just sitting by the side of one road--as we kept walking around the bend, there was another dog and another and another), tiny alleyways, and, finally, the heath.
We cut across a very small section of the quiet heath before heading back toward home for a comfort-food supper (sausages and mash), rearranging of the living room, inflating the air mattress, and saying our goodnights. Oh and did I mention that Paul brought us presents? Not just any presents . . . a loaf of Poilâne (some say the most important name in bread) currant raisin bread, which made positively heavenly toast the next morning, and a box of Pierre Marcolini chocolates (I say the best name in chocolate).
The photo doesn't do a good job of showing that the box has two tiers of Marcolini bliss--double the chocolate that Bob and I bought in Brussels. With gifts like these, you'd think Paul was trying to win the houseguest-of-the-year award or something!