From Lisbon to London!

Sophie and I were looking forward to our day in London, having lunch at a Thai restaurant in Borough Market and then seeing John Mayer in concert at the O2.

We left home at 10am and had a good journey into London, arriving at the Greenwich Peninsula at midday. After some confusion with the parking barrier (I'd pre-booked for the whole day, and we thought the barrier would lift automatically) we found a good space near the exit and popped into Costa Coffee to have a hot drink, a small snack, and use the loos.

From the O2, we took the Jubilee line to London Bridge, and it felt like we were back in Lisbon again. However, we didn't see any crazies today! Once back outside, we made our way to a quirky cocktail bar and restaurant called Boro Bistro, a little slice of France in the busy capital!

We chose cocktails - a spicy Margarita for Sophie and a Negroni for me. I wouldn't be driving for another eleven hours so I could have one indulgence!

We sat and chatted and took in all the garlicky and fishy aromas of the people having lunch near us. The tables were very close together so we could eavesdrop on the conversations, something I love to do!

After we'd finished our drinks and paid the bill, we explored the busy and bustling Borough Market, a food-lovers paradise! We even spotted a stall selling tinned fish, and the cans were similar to the ones we'd seen in Lisbon. Sophie bought a tin of smoked mussels.

Stalls sold bread, cheeses, fruit and vegetables, olive oil, wine and beer. It was lovely to wander around and have a good look! I treated us to a beautiful olive wood nibbles bowl to remember the day.

At 2pm, we walked across the road to Kolae, a restaurant specialising in southern Thai food. It's a beautiful restaurant and exudes an air of calm and serenity.

Our friendly waitress came over with the menus and talked us through the very spicy dishes so we were aware! We chose a couple of small plates, two larger portions (curry) and a side dish. The wine was on the expensive side so we stuck to a small bottle of beer each.

We chose biryani rice crackers with pickled ginger and green nahm jim and Kolae grilled mussel skewers to start, followed by a pepper curry of grilled chicken, a stir-fried dry curry of crispy pork, and a side of kale and herb fritters with fermented chilli and cashew nuts. We also ordered a bowl of rice to accompany the curries.

We both loved the biryani rice crackers but I wasn't so sure about the mussel skewers. They looked like chicken so my taste buds weren't expecting the fish! I ate two and gave two to Sophie! The curries were very hot and spicy and I was glad we hadn't ordered an expensive bottle of wine, as our taste buds were on fire! Sophie's eyes were watering, something I hadn't seen since I made a fiery Jerk chicken pasta!

Mussel skewers and biryani crackers

Curries, rice and side dish

The food was beautifully presented and delicious and it was wonderful to try new dishes. The food was so different to the meals we'd tried in Lisbon, yet they were also Thai.

We found room for dessert - mango and duck egg custard with black sticky rice, which was gorgeous!

We lingered over the meal and had a couple more drinks before paying the bill. The restaurant had emptied out, but an American couple came in and just had drinks sitting at the bar. There was a lovely, relaxed atmosphere and we'd definitely go again. The bill came to £113 but we had £80 in PayPal so that was a good bit towards the cost.

Reluctantly, we made our way back outside, admiring the beautiful exterior of the restaurant.

Before heading back to the O2 we had another wander around Borough Market and saw lots of stalls selling cheese. Sophie couldn't resist buying some Comté.

We wanted to avoid rush hour on the tube so we set off back to London Bridge station and easily obtained seats for the four-stop ride. Both of us needed the loo so we trekked into the O2 and up the escalator to a new shopping mall that definitely wasn't there the last time we visited. We eventually found the facilities and briefly looked in an outlet of Hotel Chocolat before deciding to head back to the car to relax for an hour. There's nowhere to sit and relax in the O2 unless you visit a bar and we didn't fancy paying about £15 for a glass of wine!

We sat in the car and watched the car park fill up with people. Sophie was trying to work out the demographic of the fans arriving, and most were in their 40s and older! If it hadn't been for Sophie I would never have heard of John Mayer but he must have an avid following to fill an arena like the O2!

At about 6.30pm we headed back in among throngs of people, marvelling at the queues for the restaurants! We walked in easily and up the escalators where Sophie bought a tub of popcorn for us to share. She also invested £9 in a can of beer! The prices!!

We found our seats and we had a great view!

The support act came on at about 7.30pm and she was awful. Her name was Madison Cunningham and she wailed like a banshee! We hated the songs she sang and I wish now we'd stayed away. It was just her on the stage with a guitar and we were mightily glad when she finished and disappeared!

John Mayer came on at 8.30pm and it was great to see him! Up until now, I hadn't known what he looked like, but he is very good-looking, a kind of love child of Roger Federer and Johnny Depp. Gorgeous!

It was just him on stage with a variety of guitars and, at one point, the piano, and he spent two hours with us, doing a lot of talking and showing some old interviews of when he was younger. He was fabulous! He played some of our favourites - Slow Dancing in a Burning Roon, Gravity, Edge of Desire and a great cover of Tom Petty's Free Fallin'.

We stayed for the encore and then left with a huge mass of people. We went out a different way and went along with the crowd, but we had to turn back when we came across a dead end. It was hilarious!

Eventually, we made our way out of the arena and I gasped when I saw the long queues for the tube station! Stewards were trying to keep control of the thick queue of people and I dreaded to see what the car park was like, but it was almost empty and we had no trouble getting back onto the A12.

Googly had recommended we take the M11 but I didn't fancy the dark two-lane highway so we chose the M25 and M1 instead. There were the usual lane closures and the A45 was closed in Northampton, but we were home by 1am. We were shattered! It had been an absolutely fantastic day!