Portobello Winterfest

Over the last 6 months Chris and I watched as music fest after music fest came through London. We love concerts and listening to live music so it was painful to miss out on so many good opportunities. So imagine our delight when we saw a winter music fest advertised in the paper. Even better there was free entry before 7 pm!

We started our day with a run through the park. The sun was shining and it was 54 degrees! Brilliant weather for a run. Unfortunately, the wind was at our backs on the way out. Eventually, we both made it home ... needless to say Chris had an easier time of it than I did! After the run, we made a yummy breakfast of scrambled eggs, mushrooms, sun dried tomatoes, green peppers and coriander (aka cilantro).

Then we headed down to Carnaby Street for some Christmas shopping. This area is a very trendy outdoor mall that was absolutely packed with shoppers. I find it very hard to believe that retail sales are as low as they say. Every person we saw had bags and bags of stuff... then again all the after Christmas sales have come early so I guess that is the problem... We didn't do much buying but I dropped plenty of very obvious hints to Chris (like "you should come back and buy this for me.") And as I type this, Chris is out shopping for me!

What goes better with an afternoon of shopping than Belgium beer and mussels? So we headed to Belgo. We had never been there but it has been recommended several times. The mussels were delicious but the beer selection left a little to be desired. They only had 3 or 4 beers that we had never tried and the 1st one Chris ordered was sold out. And when our beers finally arrived they were in the wrong glasses. Now that may not seem like much to anyone else but if you advertise yourself as a Belgium Beer establishment you should get it right! Oh well, I guess we will just have to go back to Belgium for the true experience...darn ; )

Afterwards, we jumped on the train to Portobello Road for the music fest. It was smaller than I expected but they had a great market set with with jewelry, clothes and other goodies. The entire event was outside under a bridge, next to the train tracks. There was some amazing graffiti (if you like the sorta thing which we do).

My pictures are pretty bad because it was dark but here you go...

The music was okay. The first band was pretty entertaining but probably not in the way they had intended. The singer was very into himself and looked beyond bored being on the stage. The guitarist was (as Chris aptly described) in a completely different band. He was dancing and really getting in to the music, just not to music we were hearing!?! There was a photographer trying to get his picture and every time the guitarist would turn his back to the audience and put his butt in the photographer's face! Too funny... Chris and I really enjoyed ourselves watching them ; )

The next band looked a little odd but they were really good. Ebony Bones put on quite a production and I couldn't resist snapping a few pictures...

First, there was the guitarist...

And then the back up singers...

Followed by the lead singer...

All together, they are Ebony Bones!

Chris and I decided to call it a night after Ebony Bones. Both of us thought it was around midnight and didn't want to miss the last train home. However, as it turns out it was only 8:30 and we were home and in our p.js by 9:15!

How sad is that?!?