A Brilliant Birthday

I may have become another year older this week, but I was given the chance to celebrate in some style!  Completely unbeknown to me, Lizzie had booked a wonderful evening in London; dinner, a show, and a hotel room.  Suffice to say, it was a magical weekend.

Destination Holborn, and the peaceful Lincoln's Inn Fields Club Quarters hotel.  Situated just off the busy Kingsway, the hotel is a stone's throw from the Strand and Covent Garden, but the bustle of Saturday afternoon London shopping may as well have been a world away - the hotel was a small piece of tranquility.

Taking it easy in the hotel

At the Club Quarters

Out into the evening air, we wandered along Long Acre and into the hubbub that is Leicester Square and Piccadilly.  Surely this is the centre of urban Britain, the pavements packed from shop to road, the constant traffic, car horns, ticket touts and loud music blaring from the shops.  I couldn't live in London, but it makes for a fascinating visit, an enormous ball of energy incomparable with any other city I have been to.

before the theatre, Lizzie had booked a table at Planet Hollywood - a chain that first came about with the financial backing of, amongst others, Syvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Bruce Willis.  The walls are covered in memorabilia, the scenes around the restaurant showing trailers of films past and present.  It is all very American, and a lot of fun, and who can resist a birthday cocktail or two?  What's more, birthday messages flash up on the screens and before long, everybody knows how old I am!



Birthday announcements in Planet Hollywood

Enjoying a cocktail

Her Majesty's Theatre lies just down the road from Planet Hollywood and Piccadilly Circus, in Haymarket.  The theatre has been home to Phantom of the Opera since it opened 26 years ago.  Regarded as one of Andrew Lloyd Webber's finest works, it is said that the whole score was written for love - in this case, for his then-wife Sarah Brightman.  The theatre is small, cosy, and very classy.  After much jostling and movement we are seated, the lights go down, and the curtain comes up.



The stage is set

Audience member with programme

An auction begins, the selling of the Paris Opera's old items and instruments.  In amongst the collection is a music box in the shape of a monkey, and a shattered chandelier.  "Some of you may recall the strange affair of the Phantom of the Opera; a mystery never fully explained," announces the auctioneer.  "We are told, ladies and gentlemen, that this is the very chandelier which figures in the famous disaster.  Our workshops have repaired it and wired parts of it for the new electric light.  Perhaps we can frighten away the ghosts of so many years ago with a little illumination..."

With that, the orchestra strikes up, the chandelier explodes into light and is raised to the ceiling, the stage comes to life through the haunting overture, the retelling of Gaston Leroux's classic tale begins.  The staging, the sets, the singing and the acting is all superb - it makes for a fabulous evening out.



Her Majesty's Theatre, Haymarket

Home the next day, and just look at how generous everybody has been!  Thank you everybody for your birthday cards and gifts.  And a special thanks to Lizzie for giving me a perfect weekend - it was brilliant.

Pressies!