Southbank and the Deathly Hallows

Friday Sonia and I took the train to Waterloo station to check out some of the sights on the south bank of the Thames.  We arrived at lunchtime, so our first order of business was to find something to eat.  We were uninspired by most of the chain restaurants at the Southbank Centre, and were happy to discover yet another food festival in the shadow of the Royal Festival Hall.  Where we had previously found a chocolate festival and an Indian food festival, there was now a "Real Food Festival."  We had to take several laps around all the stalls before we could decide which ones to patronize for lunch, beverages, and dessert -- it was a tough decision!

Baklava!

Macarons!

Baked goods!

After filling up on Paella, organic burgers, cupcakes, brownies, smoothies, iced tea, and free samples, we tried to walk some of it off by continuing on to the Tate Modern, which is housed in a former power station.

Tate Modern

I'm not a huge fan of modern art, but they did have a few nice pieces, including this amazing pile of ceramic sunflower seeds by Chinese artist Ai Weiwei.

 

We spent about an hour and a half at the Tate, and then continued along the Thames path past a replica of Sir Francis Drake's Golden Hinde.

The Golden Hinde

We took a little detour through the Borough Market, which was just winding down for the day.  The market is over 700 years old, and fills a warren of tunnels, warehouses, and open lots just south of London Bridge.  Vendors sell meat, fish, produce, baked goods, prepared foods, jams & jellies, honey, and just about anything else that's edible.  Best not to go there on an empty stomach unless you have a full wallet!

We got home around 6 and rested our weary feet while we waited for Josh to get home from work. Then we walked to our local Odeon Cinema in Wimbledon to see the final Harry Potter movie. I don't know if this is true of all movie theaters in London, but this one has reserved seating, which I fortunately discovered well enough in advance for us to buy our tickets online and get good seats -- which were right behind the "premium" seats that cost a couple pounds more. It's a strange concept, but it works pretty well. If you can plan ahead, there's no need to line up early to get a good seat. Of course, we still had to sit through half an hour of ads and previews.  We all enjoyed the movie, although I would have been just as happy to see it in 2D instead of 3D.

Afterwards, we had dinner at a nearby Thai restaurant with an unfortunate name.  It was a little pricier than we expected, but the food was good and we finished every bite before walking back home and collapsing.