A day in Piccadilly, London
I love a trip to London, as you know, and I had a nice one last month when I visited my sister Cath for the day. We based ourselves in the Piccadilly area and began with lunch at the new Duck and Waffle Local at 52 Haymarket. The menu is described as “duck driven”, though there’s a rather delightfully labelled section of the menu called “not duck”. I opted for this delicious duck burger. I just love the little duck footprints!
Cath went for the signature ‘Duck and Waffle’, which looked just as good as my burger.
Suitably fortified with duck, our next port of call was Fortnum and Mason. I had somehow managed never to set foot in this iconic department store, and thought it was high time I did. Of course Fortnum’s is most famous for its hampers, and believe me I would love to have taken one home with me.
My favourite things are the ceramic pots of cheese. They’re like the ancient marmalade pots I collect at home. I could have bought so much, but settled for a ceramic pot of Welsh rarebit, discounted from £12.95 to a bargain £2.95!
I loved the elegant sweep of the spiral staircase, and the positioning of this little ice cream stand.
Did you ever see such a sweet counter?
Marzipan carrots! Marzipan strawberries! Marzipan everything!
Having resisted the temptation to buy half the contents of Fortnum’s, we made our way round to the National Portrait Gallery and spent an hour or so perusing room after room of illustrious personages.
There are sculptures as well as painted portraits, like this solemn group.
Having seen all the portraits we needed to of deceased kings and poets and politicians, we ventured out for a wander around Covent Garden (desirable stationery duly purchased at kikki.K) and came across this delightful pub, Mr Fogg’s Tavern. We didn’t go in, but I took endless photos of the flowers for Instagram.
More food seemed to be in order after all that walking and art gallery-ing, so we enjoyed delicious cinnamon pastries at Ole and Steen, a Danish bakery on Haymarket.
After that, there was just enough time for a walk through St James’s Park and along the Thames, but my photos of that part of the walk were a bit rubbish so I won’t bother sharing them with you! I’ve just returned from a trip around Belgium and Holland, so watch this space for a few travel posts in the next few days.