With the unavoidable hype surrounding the Olympics this year, we thought it would be fun to take a tour of the Olympic Park.  I have a few tickets to some fencing events but unfortunately those all take place at the Excel Centre, far away from the main Olympic venues.  I won’t get to see the completed works during the games, so this is likely as close as I’ll get for the foreseeable future.

The majority of the tour took place a considerable distance from the park, discussing the history of the area and showcasing some of the regeneration that’s been done.  I knew beforehand that we wouldn’t actually get access to the grounds (due to the over-the-top security), but a lot of the banter didn’t really interest me.  The regeneration projects were nice to see, but obviously not what we were there for.

We were told we were the last ‘lucky’ group who would have close proximity access to the village before the games start.  The road that provided the best views (the three images displayed here were all taken on that road) was to be closed to all traffic the very next day.

The tour lasted about 2 hours and ended at Westfield Shopping Centre (which by ‘happy accident’, almost everyone attending an event here must pass through).  It was fairly informative and our guide was friendly and amenable to our questions, but as far as I know the tours have stopped now so there’s no reason to recommend going.

Having been sucked into Westfield, we stopped for a bit of Yo-Sushi lunch before heading home for the day. There are a couple more images in the gallery.

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.

It was hard not to get caught up in this years celebration of the Queen’s 60th year on the throne.  TV ads and transport posters all took on an overtly British flair, buntings and the British flag where everywhere you look and lets not forget about that extra bank holiday.

Unfortunately, the weather also decided to be very British about the whole affair and brought with it lots dark clouds as well as the inevitable rain.  This scuppered our plans to sit out and watch the Jubilee flotilla on the Saturday and just relax at home and watch it on TV.  Much more civilized and we didn’t have to worry about the rain diluting our Pimm’s & Lemonade.

We ventured out of the house on the last of the 4 day celebration to wander down to Buckingham Palace where the Queen would be traversing the length of The Mall following a service at St. Paul’s Cathedral.  There where lots of people around and the weather was co-operating for once so we spent a bit of time amongst the revelers before deciding that sticking around would only result in being overrun and made our way out of the area.

We wandered up to an abnormally empty Piccadilly Circus and took a few photos along the well decorated Regent Street.  It was nice to be able to walk around these usually crowded streets knowing that most people in the area where packed in hoping to catch a glimpse of her Royal Highness.

And since we were in the area, we headed to our favourite restaurant in China Town for some Dim Sum.

We had a lot of fun even apart from the crowds, and if nothing else the event helped me finally learn how to spell jubilee, so a resounding success says I.  There are more images in the gallery, but it was a predominantly a family portrait day.  You’ve been forewarned.

Danni and I made the lengthy bus ride from West Brompton to what was worryingly describable as a ‘ghetto’ on Sunday.  Fortunately, the ghetto was just where the bus terminated and London’s lovely Richmond Park was just down the street and around the corner.

We don’t make it out this far that often, so we had a purpose in mind.  A lot of my fellow photographer friends come to the park in order to photograph the wildlife like the many, many deer that can be found here, but we were after a doe of a different kind.

Danni was kind enough to get dolled up and pose for a few photos in the chilly winter air.  She was a real trooper as it was only about 3°C and she hadn’t actually picked an overly warm outfit for the day.

All three images were shot roughly the same way.  One great, big softbox sporting 2 of Canon’s 580 flashes as a main light, and a single, unmodified flash (another 580) as a rim light.

Normally this is where I’d link to the remaining images in the gallery, but as it was so cold we only took about 15 shots in total and quite a few of those showed my poor wife visibly shaking from the cold.  You’ll have to make due with 3 images I’m afraid!

Another year has come and gone, with several fun photo meetups taking place throughout 2011 thanks to the fine folks at POTN.  This year, for a bit of a change we met up at the Winter Wonderland for a few drinks instead of the usual ‘photo-shoot come drinking fest’ that we’ve done in years past.

That’s not to say there weren’t a few camera’s on hand to capture the evening anyway.

It was a fairly relaxed evening with quite a lot of beer consumed.  We managed to stick around till the bitter end and were escorted out of the establishment by a team of security guards at the end of the evening.

Who says Beer & Photography don’t mix.  Looks like a perfect match if you ask me!

Few more images in the gallery.