Vicki and Sheryle took a taxi to Heathrow at 6:30 this morning to catch their flights home, leaving me to my own devices today.
Once again the weather forecast called for rain that never materialized, so it was a great day to visit the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew. And there were no queues - except when I arrived at exactly the same time as not one, but several school groups.
Scared me a little at first, but once inside the gates I hardly saw them again. Kew's a big place.
Not surprisingly, the azalea garden
and the extensive "Rhododendron Dell" were ablaze with color.
But there was more than just rhodies and azaleas to enjoy.
There are several glass houses, but the "Temperate House" is the most famous - it was once the largest greenhouse in the world, and is now the largest remaining Victorian glass house.
It's scheduled to close this summer and not reopen again until 2018 so that it can undergo major renovations.
I was glad I got the chance to go in.
En route home I popped into Covent Garden Market -
looking for a few last-minute souvenirs among the craft stalls. Alas, the only handcrafts today were jewelry and textiles (mostly scarves) - other than those, it was all tee shirts and the usual tacky souvenir shop stuff. There was a very entertaining group of musicians playing, though -
The finale for my last day in London was a great dinner with Jenny and Jono in West Hampstead - and, despite making a point of taking my camera so that I could take a picture of them, I forgot to. They are doing great and it was so good to see them.
Tomorrow morning after breakfast I will take a taxi to Heathrow to catch my flight home. Last night at dinner, Sheryle, Vicki, and I tried to decide what the best part of the trip had been. But as we remembered all of the great times, we couldn't pick just one - or even a top three or top five - there were just too many.
And now it's time to go home.
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