London on a rainy day

I spent the morning at home catching up on chores and admin, and then I got the train up to London at about noon as I was going to see the new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery on Gainsborough.

The trains have been a source of frustration today - on the inward journey they announced that it was only stopping at 3 destinations so many people had to get off at the wrong destination and then find another way of getting to their required stop. Coming home again, I had about 8 minutes from when I came out the NPG to get back to Waterloo and I knew I could just make it - except silly me, I got on the wrong tube, heading the wrong way. By the time I got off and then got on the correct tube I had about 3 minutes to make my train home, so I ran all the way up the escalators and ran across the station concourse only to find that my train was a bit early today and had already departed! Grrr!!! I had to wait 30 minutes for the next train and then that train was 20 minutes late....it was just one of those days. Got home in the dark and rain feeling annoyed!

It rained all day so being inside the NPG was a good place to be. I firstly popped in to see the Taylor Wessing Prize Exhibition, which I have already seen but wanted to see it again - I am a member of the NPG (as a wonderful gift from C) so it does not cost me anything. Then I went to the organised talk on the Gainsborough exhibition. This is a unique exhibition as it is only of portraits of his family members. He is well know as a portrait artist, but in fact he hated painting portraits and much preferred painting landscapes, although they did not sell nearly as well as the commissioned portraits. The exhibition is very good, some beautiful portraits in the collection with exquisite light on the subjects, and the details in the clothing are so good you can almost hear the silk rustle.

I had no time for photos today but just took this one in a lane next to the NPG leading up to Leicester Square. The winter lights look lovely but the garbage lying outside that restaurant is appalling. A frustrating day due to the transport, but a good day as I really enjoyed the exhibition and also had a most delicious salad for lunch from Tossed.