weekend at the savoy

As a "retirement treat", we went up to the smoke for 2 nights in one of London's most famous hotels. It must be admitted that its location is second to none, and its river view rooms do indeed (at a further premium) deliver what it says on the label, affording superb vistas over Old Father Thames. Despite the frighteningly large fee extracted for this service, one nevertheless had to fork out a further £9.50 a day to have wifi connection- a little churlish, my wife felt. Always the harsh, though fair, critic, she felt the whole place lacked atmosphere, relying too much, as many "great name" hotels do, on its reputation.

And I agree. But I will say the slippers were excellent.

On Friday night we went to QEH (Queen Elizabeth Hall), directly opposite our room on the South Bank, to see a fantastic performance of Steve Reich's "Drumming", a superbly exciting experience, bringing about an almost trance like state at times (which I believe was his intention) Terrific.

Yesterday we wondered the leafy byways of Belgravia, vaguely trying to identify Roman Abramovich's place in Belgrave Square. Word has it he spent £25 million on it and a further £25 million in it, most of it on a range sophisticated security measures. I couldn't in the event be sure which one it was, but instead we bumped into a pro-Assad demonstration outside the Syrian embassy. We had a good natured chat, in which they insisted that the "troublemakers" on the streets of a number of Syrian cities are imported foreign agitators. Why do they always say that? Why is it never the people rising up to voice their disapproval of a tyrannical regime? Same reason terrorists only get to be called Freedom Fighters by one side, or of course until they win. But we thought it better to remain courteous, so after a brief exchange of views we agreed to disagree and went on our way under glorious skies and a perfect ambient temperature of some 23 degrees.

We then proceeded on foot to Harrods, an outlet I have never visited before, and now I know why. It seemed crammed with tat only people with very little taste and far too much money would be interested in. The last straw for us both was to be found at the top of the "Egyptian Elevators" where there was a huge, golden sphinx-like statue with the likeness of, guess who... Yes, that's right.
Just below this, leaning from an alcove, a singer of sub-Sarah Brightman proficiency was warbling the theme from "Titanic", at which point my wife said that never before had she experienced such a strong urge to run amok with an AK 47.

Last night we travelled the few blocks north to Covent Garden to see Werner Herzog's 3D film "The Cave of Forgotten Dreams" about the Chauvet cave paintings, only discovered in 1994 and considered so vulnerable Herzog was given just 4 days to film in there before the place was sealed off to all but a select few guardians and scientists. The film is his usual unique take on life; an intimately detailed, slowly beautiful unfolding of a mysterious phenomenon. Hundreds of depictions of animals, bears, rhinoceros, and horses especially adorn the walls of a remote cave deep inside a limestone river gorge in France's Ardeche. It isn't suggested in the film, but I wondered if it was possible it could all have been the work of one genius, one Picasso-like Cro Magnon man.