City Sunbathing

The parks in London are truly fabulous. I've been to numerous little parks and squares as well as the infamous Hyde Park. Today I ventured to Regant's Park which is just a fifteen minute walk from my flat (well, fifteen minutes for those of you who don't get lost finding your way out of a paper bag.)  Regent's and Hyde are tremendous in size and are host to cafes, man-made ponds, fountains and much, much more. Not being a city gal, I've only ever seen photos of people hanging out in Central Park, NY in the summer. Sure, I've strolled through the park on sunny days but I'd never come across those real city folk who don their bathing suits in the park. I always wondered how odd it would feel to be in the middle of the city, in a bathing suit without a swimming hole in sight. Today, I played the part of city gal, and I rented a chair in Regent's Park (£1.5o for two and 1/2 hours, not a bad deal) and sunned myself with all the other city people. Okay, I wore a tank a skirt; I still don't feel comfortable wearing a bathing suit in the literal middle of a city). But, I was there with a sandwich, ipod, a good book and a newly purchased beach (?) towel from Marks and Spencer (I'll tell you about M&S at a later date) along with hundreds of others. The park experience was interesting-- people in bathing suits, people drinking champagne and wine, even people celebrating a one year birthday party in the park complete with Thomas the Train helium balloons. There was water but it was only decent for the many swimming fowl (geese, swans, ducks and some other unidentifiable feathered friends). The closest you could get to the water was in a rented paddle boat which just seemed like too much work so I passed. Some people came to the park unexpectedly and decided to sun bathe in their underwear, others were planned right down to the fancy bikinis and matching covering ups.  The sun worshippers were as diverse as their attire -- I heard German, Italian, French and some English being spoken.  The one thing we all had in common is that we wanted to be outside on this unusually warm May day and we were either too cheap, too poor or too tired to take the two hour train ride to the beach. 

My mom will be proud to know, I wore my sunscreen; I can't say the same for all the other park lovers and red skin was abound. I find that no matter the country, most people can't seem to grasp the idea of sunscreen. Ah, humanity.