London Adventure: Saturday

Tea
Treats at the Orangerie
One of the debutante dresses. My favorite!
Baby Grand at McDonalds
One of the fun windows at the Harvey Nichols, a store in London


Today we had a taste of what it must have been like to live in "High Society" in London. We first went to one end of Hyde Park (it is HUGE!) and bought tickets for that evenings preformance of Peter Pan. Then we walked to the other end of the park to where Kensington Palace is. Before going on a tour of the palace, we went to the "Orangerie" a small tea house next to the palace set in what used to be a little orange grove. Although we didn't have tea, (juices instead) we had scones and felt very dignified during the whole experience. It is a fairly fancy place decorated in white with statues and miniature orange trees on each table. A scone here is more like a bisquit and I had one with fruit and the kids had one with cheese. They came with "clotted cream" which is more like butter than cream. They were very good. Next, we went to tour the palace. We saw some of the apartments but what really interested Janie and me were the gowns belonging to Princess Diana that were on display. Several of them we recognized from pictures of events she had gone to. Then we toured the exhibit, "The Last Debutantes", very interesting and fun! If you were of the "Upper Crust" in British Society you were "presented to the Queen" when you were 17. This meant you had an audience before her royalness and gave her a curtsey when your name was read. Then you had officially "come out" into society and so spent the following year going to all sorts of social engagements, teas, dinners, balls, etc... We read that it cost around 130,000 pounds to outfit a girl for "the season". (No small change in 1957!) But, 1957 was the last year for the 200 year old custom---the British people thought that it served no real purpose and that is was too elitist. How would you have liked to have been 16 that year and had this all taken away? We couldn't decide if you'd be sad or relieved! Anyway, the exhibit showed their invitations, their manners, their outfits and accessories and those of the young men. It was really fascinating!

After we then walked up to High Street where we had lunch at a Mc Donald's with a baby grand piano inside! They even have a Mickey D's for high society! From here, we walked up the street and did a little shopping at H&M, a wonderful store with low prices, and then TKMaxx (the same as our TJMaxx only with 10x the selection).

Peter Pan that evening was great! It is staged in a big tent that is like a theater only outdoors. It is significant that is being held in the very park where J.M. Barry first met the Darling boys and conceived the story. The flying episodes were fantastic and the scenery projected on the upper circle of the tent was amazing. You could see the London skyline and all the sites "in the round". "Nana", the nurse maid dog was done by a puppeteer and she was so lifelike. The crocodile, however, stole the show. The body was made of a bamboo-like frame with two men inside that drove it like a child's car, and the head was large and menancing but not scary. It had terrifically loud burps every now and again. The kids in the audience were half the fun! Their reactions were priceless.