Not much going on this weekend. I took Jay ice-skating, and we had lunch at a Chinese restaurant in the mini-Chinatown on Queensway, a street just west of Hyde Park in the Bayswater area. The restaurant, Mandarin Kitchen, makes the best chicken with cashew nuts I've ever had. I also had something new: e-fu noodles with mixed seafood. E-fu noodles are China's answer to fresh pasta. Soft and flavorful.

We also went to see "Seabiscuit". Nice film, but my fellow Americans have probably seen it there. This blog is about London more than anything else.

Last Sunday, David Stamp, his daughter Fiona, Jay and I went for another fine walk in the North Downs. This time, we climbed Box Hill, which is featured in Jane Austen's "Emma." Box Hill offers great, panoramic views of the North and South Downs and the village of Dorking, where composer Ralph Vaughn Williams lived. David says that, were it not for the South Downs, you could probably see the English Channel from Box Hill.

It was a perfect fall day, crisp but with lots of sunshine.

Box Hill, a National Trust property, also has a snack bar window -- called a servery -- where you can get coffee, hot chocolate, cookies and lunch fare like hamburgers (we packed sandwiches).

We made a side trip on the way back to Mickleham, a charming little village with some nice-looking pubs (we stopped at one for a quick half-pint) and a small-but-pretty church. Here's a picture of the church. Note the unusual steeple.