First Weekend Part II: Saturday Evening

So, I had a little homework from my real estate agent - "go and visit those neighborhoods I liked, walk around a bit, and see if you think you could live there."  So, even though I had a big day at the market I decided to head over to Islington in the evening for dinner.  It was the neighborhood I enjoyed the most of my tour.  Trendy and hip, but not touristy.  Diversity, from name brand to independent.  I would liken it to the East Village a bit in New York.  The apartment I was shown there was not particularly breathtaking, but it is in a superb location and I literally would have all floors of this corner building to myself.  Intriguing.  I will be going back to see it.

Anyway, I decided to walk there.  This was not a small decision, as it computed to be about a 45 minute walk, but I really wanted to use the time to get to know the area and see if any other neighborhoods stuck out.  My A-Z street guide has come in quite handy.  So, off I went.  London really is quite lovely (Brit speak), most streets are charming and small.  Roads that look to be quite significant on the map end up being tight, brick alleys so you really have to keep an eye out for where you're going (and lack of street signs on most does not make it any easier).  The buildings are mostly quite low to the ground and I have yet to see an area of glassy highrises like we would see in downtown areas in the States.

I made my way up Upper Street through the Angel neighborhood (which is known to be a good area to hang, but at this point I classify it as having a lot of name brand shopping) and into Islington.  It is an interesting, fun transition on this street into the trendy area.  There were a couple Brazilian restaurants, which I liked, and many, many delicious looking quaint cafes and restaurants.  Certainly no shortage of coffee shops and pubs in London. I stopped over to take a look at the apartment I looked at and visualized living there.  I could definitely do it.  Would need a good cleaning and a ton of flowers hanging off the windows, but I kind of like it.  Will need to balance location with commute time in my final decision, as this is a more lengthy commute.

Shannon decided to meet up with me for dinner, so we headed over to this cute Mediterranean place just off the main drag.  The lanterns in this place were amazing, I wanted one so bad to fulfill my small light fetish (oh, and as luck would have it I actually found a place that sells them the following day.  I'll be back for those once I land a pad!).  Had some great humus, delicious beet and pumpkin salad, and then some lamb sausage with yogurt sauce.  Mmmm mm.

From there we decided to take the long walk back towards my place, and then veared off to go see Covent Garden.  Everything closes pretty early here, so it was just more of a pleasant walk after dinner.  Covent Garden looks to be an interesting spot to explore as well ... in the near future.