Accidental parade

... I mean I accidentally happened upon it, rather than all these soldiers accidentally parading.

Had to go to a conference at Westminster today - and had to get there earlier than I normally leave the house.  Groan!  It went fine though, and I was able to take a break around midday and have a little wander around.  I found myself here, on the edge of St James's Park, and all of a sudden there was a cavalcade of posh cars and a full-on Horse Guards parade going by.  (Found out it was in honour of the Spanish royal visit.)  This shot didn't really work out - I was sneakily trying to capture the police officers while pointing my camera at the soldiers, but the focus ended up behind them.  Shame, because I like their individual expressions and wish I'd shifted the focus onto them.  I did spend a large portion of my time outside working up the courage to actually ask to take a portrait, but chickened out and took a sneaky shot as usual.  I wish I wasn't such a wuss!

Packed up around 5pm and set off home - nice to get back around an hour earlier than normal.  Cooked kedgeree for tea, did the online food shop, edited these photos and ran out of time to make any dent in my holiday photo processing.  Boo!