A cathedral of cakes.

The bus took us through the Elephant and Castle, past new apartment blocks and shops, Lambeth Palace and over the water to Horseferry Road. This used to be a regular haunt of mine when I was working; since then the government has sold off the building which now looks as though it's been turned into yet more expensive homes.

We walked along the road running one block behind the Mi5 building - people who have been watching me for most of my life. I gave them a quiet two fingers just to show them that they are being watched too.

But thanks to Fiona, Chris, June and Beth we were on our way here;

....a posh hotel, part of The Hilton group and not one of my usual haunts!

They bought us tea - a very expensive, all inclusive monster tea.

A cathedral of cakes;

I had traditional tea, Robyn chose Earl Grey and we sat in the window looking down on a quiet and rather exclusive residential road in one of the better parts of town.

And we talked and laughed and ate our way through two whole hours as the thin February sun slumped down over the rooves of London.

It wouldn't be something I would ever have thought of doing but I'm happy we did it. And the sense of achievement from getting everything down before the vouchers ran out was huge.

A lovely day - we are very grateful.

Nothing left, not a crumb;

It's just that then we had to catch a bus to Victoria, fight our way down to the tube, change trains and drive home.

It was Saturday afternoon so we shared the journey (the central and district lines were broken by a fault too) with assorted shoppers, football fans and what seemed to be a flash mob of party goers all in groups wearing different fancy dress outfits.

My sense of humour was beginning to fade as singing got louder and the pain levels grew......but we made it!

A special day.

Neil Harris
(a don't stop till you drop production)
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