Ten of us traveled from St. John's Wood to Ascot to attend Ladies' Day. We decided to meet at the St. John's Wood tube stop at 9:00 a.m. and take the tube to Waterloo Station where we would catch a train out to the racetrack. Needless to say we all looked pretty fancy for school drop-off. It was obvious to the teachers and staff at Abercorn where we were headed!We arrived to Ascot and promptly bought our racing cards for the day of races. We also bought our first split of champagne to the tune of 18 pounds each! But we didn't care - we were at Ascot to experience the tradition of Ladies' Day. We had lunch at the Arundel Restaurant - it was a lovely lunch and we enjoyed sharing a few more bottles of champagne and many laughs.
After lunch we walked outside to catch a glimpse of the queen. She was paraded through and around the track and then she stays in the Royal Box for the afternoon.
We made a few bets - our friend Liz Bengis was the big winner of day. I am pretty sure I came out even but it's a little fuzzy. We gave up trying to find a seat in the grandstand and instead found a table in one of the champagne tents. Our waiter, Richard, got a kick out of us and kept the bubbly coming all afternoon.
Naturally, we made some new friends - who wouldn't want to join a group of 10 women drinking champagne?! One of our new friends was former Arsenal player, Ray Parlour (pictured on the right), who invited all of us up to his skybox. This was a treat as we were able to see the whole track and enjoy some betting away from the grandstand. We could also see the Queen's skybox from where we were but she stayed out of sight.
It was a great day of us acting very silly. The next morning there was a picture of some of us in the London Times, which according to the locals, is the more respectable paper to appear in and beats Page 3 of the Sun!
Cheers!
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