Walpole Friends need you!

To travel by car or by public transport? Always a dilemma... We had to give up on a car journey from Ealing Broadway to the Kent seaside Ealing yesterday. It took over an hour to reach the M4 at the end of South Ealing Road and after further two hours we still didn't make it to the M25! Hence the sightseeing as documented in the previous post.

And my Monday?
Very nicely busy, thank you for asking! Yours?

The morning call from my offspring and our long chat were the most delightful introduction to the day, and to the week!
Then, Walpole Friends coffee morning at Pizhanger Manor where with great interest I heard about the big changes to the edifice and the whole Walpole Park to be soon implemented.Going there I didn't know what to expect. To my surprise, nearly all the seats were taken at the Georgian Eating Room upstairs where the meeting was held. The chairwoman of the Friends group approved of adding here this sole picture taken during the meeting:

Restoration and development works at  Ptizhanger Manor House and Walpole Park require large sums of money. All possible sources have been explored and more are being sought after. Why not join Walpole Friends and help the local gem shine your way? Do check out the link.

If, like me, you leave Walpole Park through the main gate (which didn't exist in Soane's times), you will see the walls which commemorate those who died in the two world wars of the 20th century...

Work took me to the little Octavia shop in Bute Street, South Ken. Emerging from the Tube I was approached by the cheerful British Red Cross volunteer who allowed me to take a picture of her and add it here. I told her that I also work for a charity, wished her success with her mission and dashed to help my French colleague at the shop.

That was another distraction: a book on Russian painting in the window of The Trinity Hospice. I may tell one of my gym-friends about it. I always like meeting this Russian lady with an amazing blond plait who used to lecture the Russian literature and now is learning to swim.

At the shop I met another Slav woman who came to England following her daughter who got a scholarship in London.  She was born in Chine, I was told, though.

Here are a few items I saw at Bute Street Octavia today:

...
On the way home

A shop window in Bute Street:

Heading for The Natural History Museum...

French Embassy:

Natural History Museum, I hadn't been there for a while, until today:

Heading back to the station at South Kensington:

The top of Victoria and Albert Museum can be seen towering above The Ismaili Muslim Centre in Cromwell Road

Good night!