On a drizzly morning, we checked out of Hotel Mademoiselle and the concierge called a taxi for the short trip to Gare du Nord, where we passed through customs and boarded the 8:13am Eurostar to London. We caught a London cab from St Pancras to the Park Plaza Hotel Westminster Bridge. It was too early for our room to be ready, so we checked in our bags with the concierge and went for a walk. We were very excited to be back in London for the first time in 3 and a half years.

We crossed over Westminster Bridge and headed down Whitehall towards Trafalgar Square. On the way, we stopped at one of our favourite restaurants, Little Frankies, where we enjoyed an early lunch of real English food.

My phone had been playing up since we left Paris, so my first goal was to find the Apple store at Oxford Circus. Thankfully, the staff there were able to fix it quickly, and we proceeded to have a look through some of the stores on Regent Street. We revisited our favourite shop in London, Hamley's Toy Store which has an amazing array of toys and heaps of staff demonstrating them.

At Piccadilly Circus, I was approached by a large group of excited young people who asked nicely to have their photo taken. At first, I thought they wanted me to take the photo, but it turned out they were on some sort of quest and for this part, they needed to have their photo taken with a black taxi and a moustached man! ... So I posed with them. They were on a trip from Italy.

We continued back down to Trafalgar Square and found that it had been taken over as a Fan Park for the Tour De France, which has commenced in England this year. Apparently, they'll be in London on Monday, but unfortunately we'll be out of town that day.

We walked down Northumberland past Citadines Hotel where we had stayed last time, crossed the Hungerford Bridge to the South bank, and continued back to the hotel. By this time, our room was ready and we caught the lift up to the 7th floor. The room is magnificently appointed and very comfortable. We don't have the iconic view of Westminster Bridge from our room as we had elected to keep the price down a little bit. Instead, our view is over Waterloo Station and the first floors of a new building which will probably block the view soon.

After a bit of time to relax, we headed off to find somewhere for dinner. We ended up at Covent Garden, where we all enjoyed our meal at a restaurant called Covent Garden Grill. We had a delightful waitress who was incredibly chirpy ... I thought she was Irish but it turned out she was from Canada!

After a bit of a look around Covent Garden, (including another Apple Store!), we crossed Waterloo Bridge and made our way home along the South bank which is a hive of activity with entertainers and tourists..