British Isles Excursion- London, day 1

British Isle Excursion -London

Thurs. July 12, 2011- Amherst, N.Y.

We were up by 5:30 A.M. It was to be a long day for us. We got ready for the day, finished packing and then weighed our luggage to make sure it was under the 50 pound limit. We then got ready to leave. The airport cab picked us up at 9:45 A.M. and soon dropped us off at Buffalo International Airport.

Check in, with U.S. Air for the first leg of our flight to Charlotte,N.C., was effortless. The security lines were minimal. The two-hour flight to Charlotte was easy and we arrived at 1:30 P.M. Now came the long part of the day. Our flight to London’s Heathrow Airport wasn’t boarding for another five hours. We walked the terminals, had coffee and people watched the hours away. The airport was busy with summer travelers.

Our London flight boarded at 6:30 P.M. on one of those wide bodied monsters with nine seats stretching across the fuselage. We watched a few movies, read our kindles and passed the hours as best we could. It is a difficult flight no matter how comfortable you are. Sleep eluded us as we grew more tired.

At 7:25 A.M. local time, we landed at Heathrow Airport outside London. We knew enough to run like hell for the customs lines to avoid a huge jam up. There was already a long line of people waiting to clear British customs. After an hour’s wait in line, the the interview was perfunctory and we were soon cleared to the main terminal. It was awash with travelers, even at this early hour.

We found an ATM and purchased both British Pounds and European
Euros to get us by for the next several days. Then we found the British Rail ticket office and purchased two tickets (L18 ea.)for the “Gatwick Express.” It is a direct rail service that takes you right into London’s Victoria Station.

The ride in was easy enough. You could easily spot the other newly arrived visitors like us. Their clothes were wrinkled and their eyes bleary like ours. At Victoria station, a nexus of the London tube and the British rail system, the crowds were even bigger. The verbal waft of a dozen languages drifted around us as we made our way through the throngs to a taxi stand outside of the terminal. There, we boarded one of those delightful, lumbering black cabs that London is so famous for. The driver was a talkative Cockney who had been to the U.S. on several occasions. We traded chat with him about the coming Olympics in London next year and visiting Disneyland in Florida, as he barreled through the massively automobile-clogged streets of central London. The huge double decker buses careened down the narrow lanes like freight trains. Driving here is not for the faint of heart.

We were booked into the Edwardian Bloomsbury hotel, up near the British Museum. The driver got us as close as the one way streets would allow. I gave the lad L 15 and we thanked him for his daring drive. The Bloomsbury, a Radisson Hotel, is just a block over from the British Museum and only a few blocks from The University of London. Pedestrian traffic here is heavy amidst the cafe,s pubs and small businesses that dot the streetscape.

The hotel agreed to check our bags, but we were too early to have a room ready for us. We smiled, said okay and headed out for the British Museum. Hordes of school groups had already entered the venerable museum before us. We decided to come back later. We walked around the busy area and spotted a very nice place called Patisserie Valerie. It is a chain restaurant that offers cappuccino, pastries and lunch. We settled in for some tasty Salad Nicoise, and cappuccino while watching the busy pedestrians flow by us. (L20)

After lunch, we walked the streets, stretching our legs and dodging the kamikaze double-decker buses careening by. Like most Americans, we automatically looked to our right when crossing the street when actually the traffic was coming from the left. It made for a few hurried street crossings on our part. The bicycle riders are not to be believed for their daring do. I would think the number of them peeled from the front of the buses must be considerable. A starbucks offered us a nother cappuccino near London University. We sat for a time enjoying the flow of people and traffic roaring by. It was getting late in the day and we hadn’t slept for what seemed like a very long time. Still we were here in one of the more exciting cities on the planet and time was of the essence. We wandered back towards the British Museum and entered that venerable institution. It had been twenty years since last we had visited the museum and we were anxious to again see their fabled collection of Egyptian antiquities.

Even in the late afternoon, the museum was aswarm with visitors from everywhere. The newer exhibits were about Australia and Afghanistan. We wandered along the marble halls enjoying the jewels, cultural exhibits and historical potpourris from across the globe. The Egyptian mummies, and all of their attendant artifacts, are always impressive. Here lies the remains of civilization form several thousand years past.

After and hour or so, the “Museum glaze” settled upon us. You can only absorb viewing so many artifacts, however attractive or significant, before they become just another glass cabinet you walk by. We were footsore and tired and in need of sleep. We left the museum and walked back to the hotel. Our room was ready. We checked into a smallish but clean room on the first floor.(L300 per night) In Europe of course the first floor is really the second and there is no thirteenth. It makes for some recalculating whenever you enter an elevator.

We unpacked our gear, settled in to watch some t.v. news and soon were fast asleep. We slept fitfully, as you always do with a big time change and a new hotel, but were glad to be here.