Notting Hill Carnival

Having never been to the Notting Hill Carnival before, I decided it was high time I went along to see this (apparently) world-renowned celebration of Caribbean culture happening almost on my doorstep. Accordingly a friend and I caught the tube into London on Sunday, dropped our overnight bags off at the Whiteleaf Hotel in Bayswater and walked along to Notting Hill. We arrived early. The crowd control measures were already in place with metal barriers lining some of the route the carnival procession would take, and well-policed 'sterile zones' at the junctions.

This is one of the 'sterile zones'.
In the background you can see barbecue smoke

All around the route were vendors barbecueing Jerk Chicken, corn cobs, etc, smoke rising into the Sunday morning air. The weather was behaving; reasonably mellow - a few spits and spots of rain and occasional gusts of wind, but mostly harmless.

Some guys enjoying the procession from their balcony, the guy in the white t-shirt dancing like a Thunderbird puppet!

There were some highly creative costumes - very colourful and elaborate - I've put some more photos on my homepage. Email me if you'd like the link.

After watching the carnival procession, we caught the tube to Leicester Square and watched The Last Airbender in 3D. I thoroughly enjoyed the film - it had some interesting, complex characters, fantastic effects in 3D, amazing performances and I liked the story. Very much looking forward to the sequel!

After a meal in Yates (one of our favourite eating places in London), we walked back to the Hotel. We'd booked in advance thinking that with it being Bank Holiday weekend and the Notting Hill Carnival, rooms would be hard to find. In fact it looked like there were plenty of vacancies, and lower prices than the online rates. Oh well, can't win 'em all. Earlier in the year I spent a long weekend in Norfolk, and my room there was at the top of the three-storey Guest House, with several narrow staircases and corridors to get there. Same story at the Whiteleaf Hotel, with a tortuous route all through the building and up countless flights of stairs. Despite the many sessions I spend at the gym, my heart was beating pretty fast by the time I was able to put my key in the door and let myself in. When you look at the outside of the buildings in Inverness Terrace, you get the idea that once upon a time, it was a wealthy area. I like the architecture. It's a little sad that the once-gracious proportions of the rooms at the Whiteleaf Hotel are now lost as they've been divided into such small units.

It was reasonably clean but offering none of the refinements (no fridge in the room, no complimentary shampoo/shower gel), and although breakfast was included, all that was on offer was cornflakes and toast. Overall I guess it was cheap enough but I can't recommend it.