A PRE-TOUR OF LONDON PRIOR TO JOINING A TOUR OF ENGLISH GARDENS.

Twice before I was scheduled to visit gardens in England including the Chelsea Flower Show. The first time the gardens and show were included in a cruise but I had an eye hemmorhage and had to abandon ship 15 minutes before it sailed. In 2021, I booked a tour with Insight Tours and it was canceled due to the pandemic. Will the third time bring me better fortune?

I flew from NY JFK to London Heathrow on May 16, traveling in Premium Select rather than business class due to price gouging on Delta. The seat reclined only an uncomfortable seven inches hard to sleep but I managed to get in three hours of sleep, about as much as I’d get in the lay-down bed. The taxi from Heathrow cost 66 GBP, much more than I’d pay for the longer trip from JFK into mid-town Manhattan. I had selected a hotel in the Kensington section of London due to its nearness to the Kensington Palace and Gardens, Hyde Park, and several museums.

Having saved a lot by not traveling during the pandemic, I decided to splurge on a “Deluxe Double” at the Merit Kensington Hotel. Arriving at 9:30 am, I didn’t expect to get a room quickly, but delightful receptionist Marcello found a room within ten minutes. Alas, it was in the basement of one of several townhouses that constitute the hotel, and the deluxe double would be called a small standard in Manhattan. I was able to move upstairs the next day, , but morethe same size room, but cheerful.

A week before departure, the long-term weather forecast called for rain every day the first week, so I was pleasantly surprised after arrival to find the weather reports calling for mostly cloudy but some sun every day. In fact, it never rained once in the ten days I spent in England.

THE VICTORIA & ALBERT MUSUEM. The first morning, May 17, I set off walking to a museum that I had chosen after googling “what to do in Kensington” prior to arrival. On a map it looked close to the hotel but it would have been about a forty-minute walk and an octogenarian needs to conserve energy before confronting museum stairs, so I hailed a taxi after about ten minutes. . Entrance is free, and the museum does not draw the huge crowds of the more famous British Museum, the largest in the world. The collection is quite eclectic with far more sculptures than paintings, my preference.

I started in the Medieval Room with beautiful pieces mostly from Italy, much of it religious as you can imagine. I didn’t remember to bring a note book to record details of my favorite works.

THE KENSINGTON PALACE & GARDEN, May 19. Both my previous canceled trips here had included the Kensington Palace an Garden, not in the schedule for the upcoming garden tour. I did not pre-book a ticket online since I had a lot of time and didn’t expect huge croweds. Surprise! The line to buy tickets was short, but the line for ticket holders was over 50 yards long.

I arrived at 11:45 am and the first ticket available was for 1:00 pm, so I wandered the famous garden. What a disappointment. It’s really an enormous park, not a garden, with hundreds of people jogging, bicycling, or walking their dogs. There are few flower beds. Adjacent to the cafe that serves lunch or high tea, is the sunken garden where Princes William and Harry installed a monument to their mother, Princess Diana. It was being cleaned at the time, no doubt due to the thousands of pigeons in the garden that pave the walkways and monuments with their droppings. I was able to crop a side view eliminating the cleaner.

Already tired from walking in the park, I got back to the Palace for my 1:00 pm ticket time. The palace turned out to be as disappointing as the garden. The main exhibit throughout was couture, the fancy gowns of royalty and celebrities from the 1500s to contemporary times.The modern gowns and extravagant male outfits seemed more appropriate for Halloween, with some outrageous outfits worn by male and female celebrities to the Met Galas, the Oscars and other award ceremonies, and events like Cannes. Since I don’t do drag, I was not inspired by the collection and didn’t take any photos. One could enjoy historic costumes more by watching Bridgerton on Netflix.

A small room houses three exhibit cases for the jewels of Victoria and other celebrities. A large space is devoted to Victoria’s childhood, her furnishings, dolls, and toys. Lacking playmates, she must have been as terribly bored as I was. Enough of touring for one day.

THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM. The next day, May 19, the sun was obscured by clouds and a chilly wind. The internet articles rave about the Natural History Museum, close to my hotel in Earls Court. The line there was about one hundred yards long, but it moved quickly and I was inside within 15 minutes. There is no admission charge. One is greeted by a cavernous hall with an enormous dinosaur skeleton floating overhead. There are dozens of smaller dinosaurs throughout the lower level. I’m sure my friends who love dinosaurs will have a bone to pick with me because I wasn’t thrilled. The upper floor is devoted to hundreds of minerals, display cases filled with rocks, each identified. I’m glad I skipped Earth Science as an elective in college. Scores of stuffed birds were equally boring, and the rooms full of arachnids. scorpions, spiders, tarantulas, and other species are interesting as long as I don’t find them in my bedroom in Mexico. Perhaps I was just tired and jet-lagged, and had picked the wrong museum for my interests.

I had been to many of the famous tourist sites in London many years ago and was not inspired to repeat the Tower of London, The British Musuem, The Tate Museum, The Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, and other truly impressive sites. But I was anxious to repeat the Kew Gardens, and I was delighted that my English Garden Tour would begin there on May 20.