The Hen Do Party

In England it is quite traditional to throw a bachelorette, or "Hen Do" party for a bride to be. It is also customary for said bride to be made to wear some sort of kitschy costume, in the case of Florence, Hélène's sister, a fake bridal gown purchased on Ebay, a princess tiara and silly lace gloves. A group of 14 of us first went to London, to a little club, where we had tapas and cocktails. Our next event was a booze-cruise on the Thames River. Unfortunately, when leaving the club we were not entirely sure where we needed to be to get the boat, so there was much running around trying to find the proper pier and not be left behind. Thankfully; we safely made it onto the boat, and the 4 hr cruise was wonderful: perfect weather, good music and even better company. We finished the evening at a club called The Borderline, which played mostly rock music. I spoke quite a bit with a lovely girl from Ireland named Ailbhe (pronounced Elva). We finally made it back to the hostel at 4:30 a.m. Meanwhile, Dad and Boris went to the park with the baby, out for dinner, then in to bed at a reasonable hour (unlike the rest of us). But I had such a nice time, I nearly forgot that I am too old to be staying up that late several nights in a row!