A Marathon Weekend

I have had simply the best weekend ever. After briefly flirting with the idea of cloning myself so that I could go to Wonderwool Wales let me tell you I wouldn't have swapped the London Marathon for anything.

Mr A and I left for London just after lunchtime on Friday and arrived at Paddington at 4:30. We were staying at Passfield Hall which is LSE student accommodation and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to anyone. We have stayed in student accommodation in London for years, long before Robert went off to university there, it's basic but clean and comfortable and excellent value for money.

Friday evening was lovely, we went for a meal in our favourite bistro, Savoir Faire in New Oxford Street, and then spent a wonderful couple of hours at the theatre with Haispray.

Saturday was my birthday - I've been 27 for some 26 years now ;-) and after a lovely breakfast we headed for Russell Square tube and then Covent Garden. On the way to the tube I had a deja vu moment when we walked passed the hotel which was the venue for the first iKnit day.

When we arrived at Covent Garden we spent a wonderful couple of hours at the Transport Museum.

I may be a year older, but that doesn't stop me behaving like a child sometimes ;-)

Lunch was a M&S sandwich on the steps of St Martin in the Fields - what a view :-)

What we did next requires no explanation. Not for the easily offended, Priscilla Queen of the Desert was just wonderful, although there is something faintly disturbing about Jason Donovan in a corset ....................

The theatre was followed by a lovely meal out with our eldest son, Robert, who was due to run in the Marathon the following day and needed some winding down and ego boosting. Bless him, he had been into IKnit and bought me a voucher, with no prompting whatsoever.

Sunday dawned a beautiful sunny day. Mr A and I headed for Canada Water on the Jubilee Line. Surrey Quays, the 9 mile marker was our destination, and we found a viewing spot and waited. We saw the elite men go past.....

....followed by the pack. How one is supposed to spot anyone is a mystery to me. We did, we sw him and he saw us, but all we managed to photograph was a waving arm.

So then it was off to Canary Wharf, where we waited at the 30km stage, somewhere between 18 and 19 miles. We saw Nell Mcandrew go past loking very fresh and full of running.

Robert is the runner all in black on the right hand side.

Back on the tube again to Westminster.

Sorry about the blurry photo.

And there he goes, almost there. I can't tell you how emotional it is to see someone you love as they make their way around the course.

Then it was off to St James park to be reunited.

And there he was, as fresh as a daisy! he had just run 26 miles, 385 yards in a time of 3h:07m:48secs and he looked better than I did. He finished overall in a position of 1401! Amazing. There were tears!

And here are my two favourite boys :-)

We were soon joined by Robert's friends, and we made our ways out and into the crowds. Amazingly we bumped straight ino an old school friend of Robert's who was working as a volunteer for Shelter. What a small world.

Sadly Mr A and I had to leave to catch our train home. It was back to Passfield to collect our luggage, we had time for a sandwich in Gordon Square which is adjascent to Passfield, and was a lovely place to sit before returning home.

It was quite simply a wonderful, wonderful weekend.