Final Apartment Preparations

Yesterday the kids and I had a goal.  Get everything in place at the apartment so we could move in today.  This meant stocking the empty cupboards in the kitchen.  Boy an I going to miss my Epicures.  And buying the household items that we were lacking.

First stop Tesco, we jumped the bus and headed out to Tesco for what turned into a not so easy shopping trip.  Brand names are different and things like tomatoe sauce are called ... ?   We had a buggy full of things that resembled things we like to eat at home.  To be on the safe side I did not purchase large sizes of food items just in case.  Kind of went against my usual buying but eating something I don't like would be 10X worse.  We got to call a cab to take us to the apartment because trying to ride the bus with that many bags would have been crazy.  I have troubles riding in a cab here.  To many  fender benders in Canada have left me jumpy at best with other drivers. I am still not okay with traffic coming at the car from the wrong side here and how close drivers get to other vehicles.  It was really nice to arrive in five minutes not thirty.

We put our purchases away then headed out to catch another bus to the City Hall exchange.  That was something that never went well.  It was the Gay Pride Parade Day yesterday.  Things kicked off from the City Hall.  That caused so much trouble with the buses.  We needed to get to the City hall to catch the bus out to Ikea and meet Steve.  the driver of the bus that we were waiting for drove into the exchange and got off to go join the goings on at the City Hall.  The bus company had to call in a new driver to take his place.  So we waited for over 1 1/2 hrs for them to get us a driver.  We had a front row seat to the crazy costumes of the participants.  Thankfully nothing to revealing or obscene.  We waited through two sudden downpours.

Finally our bus arrived and we were off to Ikea.  Our previous visit made it a quick trip.  we whipped through there and spent only 270pounds.  One cot, two chairs, set of pots, dishes, cups, utensils, towels, pillows and two duvets what a bargain.  We caught a van cab home to the apartment so we would not have to carry all that on the bus.

Then came the fun part.  Outfitting our place.  Steve had not seen it yet since we cleaned and took over we were all excited to show off our hard work.  Steve and Sammy built chairs while the girls and I stuffed duvets and washed new dishes.

Steve and my room

girls bed

Sammy's cot

At 7:10 we called it a day and headed off to find supper.  We had promised the kids a meal at their favorite place Pizza Express.  We had to walk thru the down town to get to our hotel and the restaurant.  What we saw earlier in the day with the parade in no way prepared us for what we saw on our walk home.  Nothing violent but the mess and drinking.  There was garbage amazingly thick in Custom House Square where a beer garden had been set up with a stage.  It appeared to have been shut down early because of bad behavior.  This square is usually so pretty it has fountains and the Albert Memorial Clock.  We had  to walk around broken glass, dumped beer and regurgitated beer, ick. 

Albert Memorial Clock

statue of Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's husband

Custom House Square

The Albert Memorial Clock
"The sandstone memorial was constructed between 1865 and 1869 by Fitzpatrick Brothers builders and stands 113 feet tall in a mix of French and Italian Gothic styles. The base of the tower features flying buttresses with heraldic lions. A statue of the Prince in the robes of a Knight of the Garter stands on the western side of the tower and was sculpted by SF Lynn. A two tonne bell is housed in the tower and the clock was made by Francis Moore of High Street, Belfast.
As a result of being built on wooden piles on marshy, reclaimed land around the River Farset, the top of the tower leans four feet off the perpendicular. Due to this movement, some ornamental work on the belfry was removed in 1924 along with a stone canopy over the statue of the Prince."

We have enjoyed being in the square when the clock chimed it is a nice sound.  The fountains just spray for a while then they are programmed to do a dance that is fun to watch.  It is funny to watch visitors try to stand in the middle of the water to get a picture.