A weekend in Grömitz (at the Baltic sea)

Another week, another birthday.
This time not a little bear, but my grandfather turned a year older. Nat and I went to visit him and meet my dad, my sister and her husband at his place.
We were absolutely lucky with the weather, spending a lot of time on the beach, enjoying the sun in a beachbasket, playing frisbee and even going for dip in the sea!

The bear's birthday picnic

Time flies and the little bear already turned 4 this year. Much to his delight, we organised a little after work picnic in beautiful St. James' Parc (with outlook on Buckingham Palace). The bear was quite excited to spend a night in town, with all attention on him and -best of all- a fabulous birthday cake to share with friends.
Happy Birthday Bodo!!

Ein fröhlicher Verkehrspfosten

Happy Birthday Elizabeth

The Queen is turning 82 today.
I do wish her a very very happy birthday, a great party and hopefully a massive birthday cake :)

Cheesy namesake

Looks like I found a long lost sister. She seems to have a successful career in the cheese business.

A weekend with Anke

My ex-flatmate Anke spent last weekend in London. After we hadn't seen each other for almost 2 years, we had a LOT to chat about.

On Saturday we started our day with a great breakfast at the Breakfast Club (31 Camden Passage, N1 8EA). It's a really cute place that serves lovely hot and cold breakfast and wonderful smoothies (I had a "Green is Good" Smoothie with melon, spinach, mint, yoghurt and apple... very fresh and yummy!).
Besides the lovely location, the friendly service and the nice time we had, the breakfast was also a notable event, because Anke had her very first encounter with HP Sauce :))

After a little detour to Sainsbury's with their endless range of crisps and a stopover to drop the bags at home, we made our way into town for a stroll through Covent Garden with lots of shopping.



Later, Nat came over from Chelmsford and we went out in Shoreditch, starting with a tasty meal at Shish (313 – 319 Old Street, EC1V 9LE), a mini-chain (of 2 restaurants in London) specialised in oriental food like shish and hot and cold mezze.



Afterwards, we went for a drink in several bars in the area... at the Foundry (84-86 Great Eastern Street,EC2A 3HY), Bar Kick, and finally at the Favela Chic Club (91- 93 Great eastern Street EC2) a London dependance of a club in Paris with the same name. The club was quite fun... I absolutely loved the whimsical decoration: Big palmtrees, a pair of spare legs upside down, a patchworky wooden wall and circus like stripy pink hoola hoops hanging from the ceiling. The music was very mixed, sometimes a bit weird but one could feel that the DJ just had fun and that was pretty infectious...
Unfortunately the club closed at 2 o'clock and we hopped on a bus home... but after all we were a little bit tired from all the marching during the day :)



Sunday started a bit grey, but in the afternoon, the sun came out. After a bit of a success-less hunt for "the best fish'n'chips in town" we changed plans, got some nibbles in the supermarket and went for a picnic in Hyde Park.






Note: London squirrels are not afraid at all. This one seemed to be a real poser, patiently waiting for me to take my picture... and as soon as I put my camera away, it hopped off.

Sunset in Islington

Coming home after work...catching this beautiful end of the day light just before getting home. Oooooooooooooooooooh. :)