Being a real tourist

Finally took the opportunity to get some sight-seeing in, along with approximately 236 miles of walking this weekend. On Saturday, I spent a wonderful day at the Victoria & Albert Museum of art and design, which includes collections of jewelry, textile arts, ironworks, and at the moment the fashion history of The Supremes. Some of my favorite items:




This was part of a large display of historical biscuit tins:


This "chandelier" is hanging in the main entryway - it's composed of hundreds of black glass pieces suspended from the ceiling:


The giftshop may be the best museum shop I've ever seen, and they don't even force you to go through it in order to exit the building.

Sunday the weather was actually sunny(-ish) so I went to Regent's Park, which is a block from my hotel. It is more than 400 acres of the most beautiful public land I've ever seen. Seriously, it's HUGE:


There is a boating lake, athletic fields, an English garden, several small snack bars, multiple buildings, and more goose poo than you would ever believe. The flowers are the most amazing part to me:




There are even black swans on the small lake:


Lastly, I did my tourist duty and headed down to Picadilly Circus:


It was a real zoo, though, so I trekked further down to Trafalgar Square, where they'd set up a huge screen to watch the Olympics. I caught some women's field hockey - Great Britain vs. Germany:


In the square in front of the National Gallery, there were many artists (and their dogs) creating mostly amazing sidewalk chalk art:


More walking took me to the Royal Mews, where some guards and horses patiently put up with tourists and their cameras:


And then I went home. Whew.