The Return To Winter Wonderland< Bullseye | Blog | Climbing The Mount > During my Christmas holidays, I went to London to enjoy the festivities there. I travelled by train from Guildford to Waterloo station with Gabriella. We had some hot chocolate drinks inside a café at Waterloo station to warm ourselves up.
After we had our warm drinks, we walked towards the South Bank. We saw some Christmas themed stalls, and I took a photo of Gabriella with the Thames, and the Houses of Parliament behind her.
There were some street performers, a few of them were the same ones I had seen when I went there summertime, which you can read about here. Some new street performers were also there, including one dressed as Superman, and another as a Royal Guard, who all just stood still. Another guy was doing robotic dancing.
We walked to where the London Eye was located, as Gabriella had not been on it before. We went inside a building to buy our London Eye tickets. A waxwork of the famous singer Luciano Pavarotti was at the start of the queue. I took Gabriella’s picture standing next to him.
The queue moved quicker from than what it did when I was last there. We were able to buy our tickets in no time at all. Before we went on the wheel, they had a new attraction, a 4D cinema presentation about the London Eye. We had a bit of a wait to get inside the cinema. We were given special 3D glasses, which were huge, they looked funny on Gabriella. The 4D film was fun, we had a birds eye view of London from the air and some of the famous landmarks like the London Eye, Big Ben, and St Paul’s appeared in 3D. There were some funny effects, which were part of the 4D fun, and they included bubbles, flashing lights when there were fireworks, and being squirted with water and air.
After the 4D film, we joined the queue to get on the wheel. Gabriella was starting to get nervous about getting on it, when she saw how high it was. It was then our turn to get into one of the pods on the wheel with some other people from the queue. When we got on the wheel, Gabriella sat down on a seat and was too scared to look out of the window. I managed to talk her round, she stood up and looked out of the pod windows to see the Thames River and Houses of Parliament, and she started to enjoy it.
I pointed out some of the famous London landmarks to Gabriella from the window.
I took some good photos from the London Eye, and we asked a couple to take our picture together.
After the ride on the wheel had ended, we walked back to Waterloo station, and we caught an Underground train to Piccadilly Circus.
When we got off the Underground train, I showed Gabriella around Piccadilly Circus. She stood in the centre of it, and I took her picture.
We then visited a tourist shop, and it had many gifts representing the famous things about London, such as toy red double decker buses, taxis, red telephone boxes, red post boxes, Royal Guards, Beefeaters, Union Jacks, postcards, sweets, teddy bears, and all kinds of stuff. I asked one of the shop staff to take our picture standing next to a Mini car and a Beefeater. Gabriella bought a red London bus postcard for her nephew.
The time was getting on and it was past lunchtime. We were both hungry, so I suggested we eat in the nearby Russian restaurant Abracadabra, which is part of the HeyJo Club. I have been there quite a few times before, which you can read about here. I chatted to Egita, a girl who works there, I was in a music video with her last year, which you can read about here. We both ate nice meals, I had fish and chips, and Gabriella had Beef Stroganoff and we were given a complementary side dish, which were pickled vegetables. David West the club owner came over to our table to say hello and have a chat, as he recognised me. I like it there, as they are friendly and chatty people.
After we finished our meals, we headed back towards the London Underground passing some nice shops on the way. I recognised a woman staggering in front of us, she was very drunk, I never liked her much, so I didn’t say anything to her. We got on an underground train, which took us to Hyde Park to where the Winter Wonderland event was located. I went to the Winter Wonderland event the previous year, which you can read about here. This years Winter Wonderland was much better and bigger, and included lots more rides, a Ferris wheel, and a circus.
Gabriella and myself had a great time at the Winter Wonderland. It was very Christmassy with the German Christmas market, nice food and drinks, and all the Christmas themes throughout.
It was fun walking round looking at all the rides.
We saw the Beast, which was a huge inflatable dragon type creature, and you could go inside it.
They had sadly sold out of tickets for the circus event. We bought tickets to go on the Ferris wheel instead. The Ferris wheel was on a smaller scale to the London Eye, and faster, but it was just as fun. It was just Gabriella and me inside the pod, which made it cosier. She was again scared of the heights, I had fun by making the pod rock back and forth. There was a great view of the park and all its rides lit up at night.
We then went on a train ride around the park, which was fun.
Then we walked round the park again and I took some more photos.
It was starting to get very cold, so we drank some more warm hot chocolate, and this time it had Baileys put inside it.
We visited some stalls that were selling some interesting Christmas gifts. There was a stall selling a nice selection of tasty looking sweets. I bought a big lump of chocolate and orange stuff, which tasted a bit like fudge, and we shared it. There were lots of people ice skating, but we could not sadly get tickets.
We decided to leave Winter Wonderland, and visit somewhere else. I suggested we head back to Waterloo to see more of South Bank, and we could go inside the Tate Modern art gallery. So, we got on the underground train back to Waterloo and walked to the South Bank. We looked round German Christmas market along the South Bank.
It looked very pretty along the Thames at night, with the lights of the buildings and streetlights reflecting off the surface of the river. The trees had lights in them, and there were a few Christmas trees dotted around as well. The Oxo Tower’s letters shinned brightly red into the night’s sky. We walked arm in arm, and it was quite romantic.
On a small spot on the riverbank of the Thames, there is a sandy beach. There were two large faces carved into the sand. When we walked back that way later that night, the Thames tide had covered it all with water.
I then took Gabriella to the Tate Modern art gallery. She didn’t like most of the modern art, but enjoyed seeing some of the unusual art on display from world famous artists like Picasso and Warhol.
After we had finished looking round the gallery, we walked back towards Waterloo to catch our train back to Guildford. On the walk back to Waterloo, we found a small pier and walked together to the end of it, looking out across the Thames, and we could see St Paul’s. We had a dance on the pier together, and Gabriella showed me her traditional Hungarian folk dancing.
It was now very late at night, we had been in London from morning until late at night, and the time had flown by so fast. We arrived back at Waterloo, and our train back to Guildford was ready waiting for us. It was a fantastic day out, and a great way to enjoy Christmas.
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Thanks for reading my post. It was a great day out. Winter Wonderland is free to enter and walk round it, but you have to pay to go on the rides. The German Christmas market in Hyde Park is very nice with all the smells and sights too.
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Wow! It looks like such a fun filled day! I didn't realise Winter Wonderland was free. I'll have to try go this year before we zoot off to the Southern Hemisphere.