Day 1 of our short two day trip to London staying once again at the Civil Service Club.
Our first disappointment on arrival at the club to drop our bags was that the restaurant no longer opens on Wednesdays. Apparently it is now only open Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I am sure it used to be the case that it was open every day except Sunday and Monday. The bar menu is still available.
We opted to spend the afternoon at the London Transport Museum in Covent Garden which we passed on our last visit. It is only a few minutes walk from the Club and we first dropped in for a modest lunch at an Italian restaurant which was not too bad and certainly served reasonable portions.
On arrival at the museum we are approached by a woman who apologised and explained that due to technical difficulties they were only able to accept cash. Not a problem for us but as compensation, tickets were reduced by £1.50 to match the online pre-booking price. Sophia is still free (just).
Due to the half term holidays the museum was very busy with a lot of noisy youngsters. However, I feel that it is quite a lot better than the National Railway Museum on York which we visited last year (although the NRM is free). The LTM tries hard to convey the history of transport in London with some clear chronology. It also has a wide variety of different exhibits and not just a display of buses and underground trains.
Unsurprisingly, I only had time to see less than half of the exhibition but fortunately the tickets last for a year.
Afterwards we returned to the Club and ate dinner in the bar which was surprisingly crowded. The menu wasn’t too bad and I think it has been expanded since last time, perhaps partly to compensate for the lack of restaurant.
Bus Scrolls showing distinations
