Walking the streets of London

No,not in the prostitute sense. I had a slightly silly weekend. Living as I do near Cambridge and being invited to a night out in London, somehow the cheapest and best way to do this seemed to involve going via Oxford. Hmm. Anyway, us being general cheapskates, we decided not to join everyone else at School Disco (please, we're just a little bit old for that now). After a certain amount of time, school skirts and ties just look wrong. After about the age of 15, really.

Initially there were going to be lots of us going to this other club, some place called Collide-a-Scope which actually appeared to be the student union of one of the London colleges, but due to illness, confusion and other stuff, it ended up being me, other half and best friend. None of whom were actually celebrating our birthdays. This place had pints for £2 and entry for £5 - in London! - and a fab view of the Thames - no really, you could actually, drink, dance and watch Big Ben, the houses of parliament and the London Eye at the same time.

So good time was had by all, then it came time to leave. From Surrey Street, Holborn, to Marble Arch where our bus was going. We looked at the tube map (which by then had of course finished) and it didn't look all that far. We asked the nice bouncer man and he sort of laughed when we said we would walk. He sort of gave us directions, but by this time other half had lost patience and started walking. Bouncer man (who was quite burly and black) said oh, he looks like he knows where he's going.

He didn't.

But it wasn't that hard, as it turned out, just long and far. And for some reason, other half, who is a foot taller than me, and best friend who is actually two inches shorter than me, decided to march at speed the whole way. I mean, really, really fast. My 'funky' trainers are not really that comfy (at least it was trainers) and I had developed at least eight blisters within minutes.

It's a pretty nice walk at night, actually, much less crowds and all the buildings are visible and lit up all prettily - you can actually see them. It's quite cool.

However, no time to stand and stare with OH and BF, oh no, it was marching all the way. Were they trained in the SS or something? There was a reason for this - if we missed this particular bus, we would have to wait a whole hour for the next one. But still, I was panting away, having already expended all my energy boogeying on down in the club. And walking earlier. There was generally a lot of walking.

It took a really long time to get to Oxford Street. It then took an even longer time (well, the blisters were getting really quite agitated by this stage) to get from there to Marble Arch.

So finally we're at Marble Arch which is like a massive roundabout. The bus stop was two massive carriageways and a small piece of park away. How to get there? No obvious or nearby pedestrian crossings. A subway - which, on close inspection, was thoroughly gated and dang it all if I hadn't forgotten by wirecutters.
So throwing caution to the wind(s) I grabbed OH and BF and dragged them across the road - at least four lanes - obviously checking both ways like a good little girl, only to find a rather peculiar trough-like barrier on the other side. Not jumpable with my 5'3" frame, so some rather inelegant climbing followed. Across the park. Then, goldarn it, another troughy thing. So more clambering.
This second section of carriageway was a bit more hairy. Largely because this was where all the buses went. And you just do wiggle quite a bit when a massive bus goes past you.

Of course, we did eventually succeed in crossing the road. And who needs limbs, really, I mean four is more than many people have. I'm quite happy with a pair of tits and a head on my shoulders.

The bus back was a bit full of extra enthusiastic teens. We fell asleep.