Wimbledon

The mini-grocery across the street turns out to have a pretty decent patisserie.  We haven't really had a pastry update so here is what  I purchased today, a pain au chocolate and a pain au raisens.

Both are pretty good doughnut substitutes, especially considering this is most definitely not France.

England has a couple of ways of constantly reminding me that it is England.  These reminders are painted on many of the crosswalks.

After a life time of looking left to survey oncoming traffic it actually required for me a fairly significant effort to start looking right before stepping off the curb.  You HAVE to look right, traffic traveling on the left side of the road is coming from that direction.  The English think it important enough that they have painted the instruction right there on the pavement.

Jimi coulda, woulda, shoulda been here but he is not.  We still headed out to one of the places that he would have wanted to see.  Here are FT and Santini and the Wimbledon Underground Station.

We followed Wimbledon Hill Road and quickly discovered how that road got its name.  There is a really big hill.  Up the hill, walk along through the town at the top of the hill, finally start to descend, turn a corner and here is our first glimpse of the All England Lawn Tennis Club.

The grounds are officially closed but we were allowed into the Shop and out the back door of the shop into a limited area fronting on this, the new Centre Court.

And off to the right towards the old Centre Court, now known as Court 1.

We went through the museum,  The John McEnroe hologram presentation was our favorite.  This was one of the most poignant.

It appears in the section of the museum devoted to equipment.  The metal racket on the left is a Wilson T-2000, the first really successful metal racket.  That particular one was used by Billie Jean King.  It was also for most of his career the racket of choice for Jimmy Connors.  It was also for quite a long span of years the racket of choice of my brother Jim.

I have posted photos of my FT and myself with Lord Stanley's Cup. Today we came into the presence of a couple more really well known and important sport trophies.  Here is the Lady's Singles Plate:

 And the Gentleman's Singles Trophy:

A view from outside the gate:

The new one is for my brother.

I have found myself looking at the stuff in the sidewalk.  I think this is probably the water turn on-off switch.

This one is really odd.  The fire hydrants are embedded.

Santini discovered this place, the Chelsea Potter Pub on King's Road.  The intertubes indicate that this was at one time a favorite watering hole of Jimi Hendrix and one or more members of the Rolling Stones.

Regardless of whether that is true or not it was a fun experience.  Here is a look at the food.

The top two are both Sunday roast with chicken featuring potatoes roasted in goose fat and Yorkshire pudding, lower left is Steak and ale pie with mashed potatoes and a jug of gravy, and lower right Lamb shank shepherd's pie with minted mash potatoes and a jug of gravy.