I was in London again today, this time with my whole family. It was a good day out, but exhausting, exacerbated no doubt by the effort of trying to transport two children in a double push chair (pram/buggy) on the London Underground. I don't know how families and disabled people get around London on a regular basis. Honestly. None of the Tube stations we used had any effective disabled access, with no lifts or ramps. We had to resort to carrying the push chair together, while the children were carried or hand-held by my sister. A nightmare...
Onto perfume, I managed to fit in a visit to Fortnum and Mason, on Piccadilly. Fortnums is probably not the first name that springs to mind when thinking of perfume but actually they stock a good selection, including Amouage, Nasomotto, Clive Christian, Xerjoff and Caron (including urns). Today I tried Oroville by Xerjoff, which is part of their Shooting Stars collection. It is an interesting take on tobacco, with clary sage, neroli, chamomile, orange blossom, sandalwood, tobacco, vanilla, amber and musk. I really liked it. I also tried Caron's new(ish) Yuzu Man, which is essentially a good-quality citrus and woods fragrance. It's nice, but hardly groundbreaking.
Fortnums is a great place to visit by the way, with a wonderful food and grocery selection. It's on the expensive side but then again, nothing in this part of the world is exactly a bargain!
Last year, while visiting London, I had exactly the same thoughts about the subway. I didn't need any disabled/special needs access but I'm so used to seeing it everywhere in the U.S. that I notice immediately when it's not available. But I should say that London is far from being the worse place for a disabled person or somebody with kids to travel.
ReplyDeleteUndina, true, and to be fair, the London Underground is improving. I suppose one has to remember that large parts of the underground were built in late Victorian times and pre WW2, so it's understandable. Still, it can be frustrating, particularly this time of year when London is so busy, hot and crowded!
ReplyDeleteLike Undina mentioned, here in the US you HAVE to have accessibility for the disabled. I'll have to take note of the lack in the UK next time I'm there.
ReplyDeleteSo have you sniffed a lot of the Jerkoff line err I mean Xerjoff? (I also pronounce it Jerkoff - I'm bad bad bad!)
oops I meant "always" not "also"
ReplyDeleteHa, Jerkoff, I hadn't quite thought of the line like that! I haven't tried a lot - only three of them I think. They smell good but I wouldn't say that what I've smelled so far has been incredible, for that price point...
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