Day 9 (2025) - Another White Jacket and a Show

Friday was our first full day in London. Brian suggested we go to an area called the Portobello Market that has a lot of thrift shopping places. We mapped out that the bus was the best way to get there so we headed towards the bus stop, with an eye on someplace to grab some breakfast. We shortly came upon a cafe and most of us found something to eat, and some (wait for it) coffee.

We found the bus stop a short walk from the cafe, did our easy tap-and-go and sat down for the 25 minute ride. 

We hopped on the bus (Gus)

We got off where our app told us to and had a short walk to get to the market. But first we had to cross the street. After about 10 minutes of not knowing which way to look first, we all safely made it across and headed towards the market. Other parts of London have "look left" and "look right" painted on the road by crosswalks, which would have helped here. But we were not actually at crosswalk so we were on our own.

This would have been helpful

At first we were all a little disappointed in what we were walking past, as it was mostly buses on the side of the road with what is best described as "crap" for sale as well stores that really had no appeal. But after about 10 minutes we arrived at the start of the actual market area. It was stall after stall of flea market type goods - clothes, watches, jewelry, knickknacks, etc. Amanda was in the market for a watch so that was our first purchase.

Deep in negotiations

Anyone need a watch?

Snoopy and Friends?!?!
Could this BE any more perfect?

We walked around a bit more and found a ton of clothing for sale. Debbie was in heaven. The first place she went to had a black suede jacket that she immediately tried on and loved. She was all ready to buy it when the seller notified us that, unlike the watch seller, she did not accept credit cards - only cash. But since England had bolted from the EU they only used pounds, not Euros, and I had none. I did a little reconnaissance to see if there was any place near us to convert Euros to pounds but there was nothing in the area. We told the woman we would walk around a bit and try and get cash and come back. As you will see later, this lack of a credit card machine proved to be a fatal error on the seller's part.

We would own this but for a credit card device

After leaving the black jacket stall, Debbie spent (a lot of) time looking at other clothing, as did Brian. Brian tried on a few Burberry jackets and settled on a light tan one, evidently from the 80's or 90's. It was in good condition so Brian is now the owner of a Burberry jacket.

A fine looking chap

Debbie, meanwhile, found a stall that had a whole bunch of jackets that she liked. This was good news and bad news as she now had trouble figuring out which one she liked the most. She sent photos to her clothing gurus, with varying opinions on them all. This didn't help her decide, so after debating back and forth, she ended up getting none of them.

These were but a few...

By now the hangriness had returned to most of our traveling party, so we headed to the "food court" section of the market. The vendors here were almost unanimously aggressive in their offering of free samples to entice us to buy something at their locations. So much so that Debbie basically walked through the area like a celebrity trying to avoid paparazzi with her hands out shaking them saying no. Eventually everyone found something to their liking and we sat on a curb and ate lunch.

 

After lunch we start off to walk through the rest of the market down a different street and slowly made our way out of the market, stopping to snap some photos in Notting Hill that Amanda wanted. 

 

The evening plan was to see the musical Mrs. Doubtfire, which I had bought tickets for the night before at dinner. I made 5:15pm reservations in the morning at a pub in the area of the theater, so we headed back to the house to recharge before we headed out again.

However, Debbie was having non-buyer's remorse about not getting one of the jackets and she asked if I minded going back to the market to get one - with her focus on a white jacket, but a completely different white jacket than the one she had purchased in Vienna (and was now wearing every day!). Thus, within a few minutes of arriving back at the house Debbie and I were off to retrace the route we had done in the morning and head back to the market, after changing the reservation to 5:45pm to give us more time.

For all of the fun we experienced on the trip so far, Debbie's trip was made at this point. See, Debbie had spent a lot (and I mean A LOT) of time picking out her outfits for the trip (whereas I packed in about 8 minutes, and I may have overestimated that by about 4 minutes). She actually had help from Lisa in putting together just the right outfits for the various cities and expected weather. While I told her she looked very nice each day, I am not sure she really believed me. 

On our hustle back to the bus to get back to the market we had to cross a relatively busy street. Since we still had not really gotten the hang of where to look we started to cross and realized there was a couple on bikes heading at us. We were able to get across the street after the man had passed but we kind of cut off the woman, forcing her to stop. 

When we were safely across and the woman was able to start up again, she called out to us "Excuse me." We thought she was about to berate the two dumb Americans who couldn't cross a street correctly. But no! She followed up with "I love your outfit!" and kept going. As we (rightfully) assumed that she was talking to Debbie and not me, Debbie spent the rest of the trip back to the market with a HUGE grin on her face.

After this thrilling moment, we shlepped back to the bus stop, got on the bus and did the whole Frogger thing again to start our walk to the market. We arrived back at the jacket seller and Debbie tried on the white jacket again along with a series of other jackets. Debbie also really wanted, or liked at least, the "upside jeans" the seller was wearing. A decision needed to be made, and we are now the proud owners of another white jacket.

We did not purchase these

We headed back to the house, but not before we just had to stop off for a coffee and a scone on the way back to the bus! Both really hit the spot.

After nearly recreating our Louvre escapade by having no clue how to find the right bus stop going the right way (and asking a 12 year old where to go) we hustled back to the house, freshened up and we all headed out to the tube to go to dinner and a show. We took the Piccadilly Line to Covent Gardens and went to head to the street, only to hear the announcement that the steps to get out numbered something like a million (or maybe a little fewer), and they recommended taking the lift to the street. Well, after our experience in Montmartre with the 180 steps they didn't have to convince us to follow their instructions and we all took the lift up.

We headed to dinner at Maxwell's and had a perfectly fine dinner, and Brian had a local pint, but nothing much to blog about, and headed to the theater. The tickets I had purchased were excellent - about 10 rows back in the center, with an aisle seat for yours truly. The show itself, while clearly not a classic, was quite enjoyable, and fun was had by all.

After the show we weaved our way back to the tube, took another lift down, and trained back to our house where we settled in for the night. Tomorrow the plan is to actually do some sightseeing and work our way around town and see as many of the major landmarks as possible. Until then, toodle-oo.