Posts Tagged ‘st. james park’

Danni’s Birthday Tea at the Ritz

Thursday, June 28th, 2012

As happens every year around the 27th of June, Danni’s birthday once again made an appearance and we were fortunate enough to have her mom here to celebrate with us.  In fact, she organized a lovely afternoon of tea & scones at The Ritz.

I’ve had lunch at the Ritz in the past (compliments of Danni actually) so I wasn’t a virgin to the scene, but I always feel slightly awkward in the midst of such opulence.  Fortunately, the staff are more than accustomed to the unrefined  looking to experience a bit of the high culture and nobody ever makes you feel out of place.  Even if the place looks like this…

Having recently had tea at the Langham Hotel, it was inevitable that comparisons were drawn.  While it’s hard to beat the settings of the Ritz, the larger selection of tea and cakes at the Langham win out for me.  I also preferred the scones at the Langham, and I’m something of a scone connoisseur (by that I mean I stuff as many as I can into my face whenever the opportunity presents itself).  The price difference is negligible, so I suppose it depends on what it is you’re looking for. As an experience, the Ritz wins hands down.

We tried to take as many photos inside while still remaining conspicuous, but that’s not always easy to do with a really large camera.  After a few post-tea poses in their reception area, we decided to stroll through the parks in and around Buckingham Palace.  Some of us very much needed to burn off a few scone-induced calories.

Like all touristy destinations, I don’t often go to Buckingham Palace unless we’re acting as tour guides for visiting friends or family.  It’s a lovely area and the surrounding parks are always well kept, perfect for a few photos.  As this June as been impossibly wet, you may have guessed that the sky in the above photo is not 100% authentic.  Well, it’s authentic sky, just taken from my recent trip to the Caribbean and transplanted into a few of the photos in this set to make things a bit cheerier.

After an hour or so of strolling the parks, we headed home to rest up for our dinner at a neighbourhood Thai restaurant that evening.  Hopefully Danni and her mom enjoyed the day as much as  I did.

There are some more photos of the day tucked away in the gallery.