"Following a vampire and an archaeologist to London" Trip Report COMPLETE About This Page:

[POOH]

What a great start. Great pictures. How great that you got to meet up with Cheryl and Mark. Those small planes can be nerve racking. I took and even smaller one from Vegas to the Grand Canyon. Had to pry my sister's hands of the hand rest.

[mcc0313]

Great pictures Sabine...what a great trip so far.

[Disneybine]

Originally Posted by POOH

Those small planes can be nerve racking. I took and even smaller one from Vegas to the Grand Canyon. Had to pry my sister's hands of the hand rest.

Yeah, believe it or not, I've been on the same one and I was ready to take a bus back to Vegas as I did not want to get back on that plane!

[Clare loves Stitch]

Yeah Sabine, i avoid the underground at all costs its always soooooo busy! I refuse to work in london because of it.

Originally Posted by chezp

And the building you were trying to remember the name of - well, it's known by everyone as the Gherkin. I had to look up its real name, because I couldn't remember it, as it's the Gherkin but it's really called the Swiss Re building.

LOL ... well done for clearing that up Cheryl... I only know it as the gerkin! as i was reading this thinking it must have another name and i had no idea what it was

[KMB733]

Great start! Love all the pictures of the Tower of London!

[DrDolphin]

Sorry to hear about the bumpy flight on the small plane!! Can't wait to read more!

[Nimros]

Excellent start!!

I loved your photos - I even got to say, "I know that, I've seen that!" because of Cheryl's and Sue's TRs.

The plane ride sounded like an adventure - as well as traveling by train and the tube. It's just so out of the ordinary to me as here, we just jump in the car to get somewhere or take one big flight if it's far away. Maybe a bus or a taxi - but that's about it.

Ready to see what's in store next...

Oh, and uhh, the "Twilight" reference....? I'll admit I cheated and had to Google it - you tell!

[pamcarey]

Great TR so far! I would LOVE to visit the Tower of London. As far as the Twilight reference, I'm stumped. And I read and loved the whole series. Eagerly awaiting the answer to the trivia question!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Nimros

The plane ride sounded like an adventure - as well as traveling by train and the tube. It's just so out of the ordinary to me as here, we just jump in the car to get somewhere or take one big flight if it's far away. Maybe a bus or a taxi - but that's about it.

The irony is I think we all had this discussion that night about public transport and how you use it over here for the major cities, whereas in most places in the States, you just jump in a car. I guess if you think of London as being like somewhere like New York - most people wouldn't drive there, they'd take a train, taxi etc. and there's every chance you'd have to take two trains, followed by walking if you went to NYC. I remember we took a taxi from the airport to get to our hotel - but if we had taken the train, it would've been train, subway and then walking.

[Disneybine]

Alright, here comes the answer to the trivia question:

In the fourth book of the Twilight saga, Breaking Dawn, Bella receives a wedding gift from Aro from the Volturi... Here's an excerpt from the book (p. 531 f):

The gift was presented in an ornately carved, ancient wooden box inlaid with gold and mother-of-pearl, ornamented with a rainbow of gemstones. Alice said the box itself was a priceless treasure, that it would have outshone just about any piece of jewelry besides the one inside it.

"I always wondered where the crown jewels disappeared to after John of England pawned them in the thirteenth century," Carlisle said. "I suppose it doesn't surprise me that the Volturi have their share."

The necklace was simple - gold woven into a thick rope of a chain, almost scaled, like a smooth snake that would curl close around the throat. One jewel hung suspended from the rope: a white diamond the size of a golf ball.

[OhToodles!]

Interesting. I'm going to get to reading those Twilight books one of these days....

[Wendyismyname]

oooh that's right!!

[Disneybine]

Friday, July 17th – Part two: It’s London, of course it rains!

It was noon by the time we got back onto the Tube to head back to our hotel.



Luckily, the subway train was nice and empty! Our hotel looked great on the outside, and so did the lobby (I’ll post pictures later on in this TR). However, when we got to our room, we were not impressed:


The bed was nowhere near big enough for the both of us, but since the (rather unfriendly) lady at the check-in desk insisted that it was a standard bed for two people, there wasn’t much we could do. At this point, I was so glad we had opted to just bring one suitcase because there’s no way we could have fit two suitcases into this tiny room!





We were both exhausted, having been up since 3am, so we took a quick nap. Cheryl had sent me a text earlier that she didn’t feel up for meeting us for dinner and would instead just meet us at the London Eye later that night. So we decided to try the restaurant we were gonna go to together by ourselves anyways. Wagamama is a Japanese restaurant chain, and luckily, there was one only 5 minutes away from our hotel! We got there around 3pm, and there were only two other parties dining at the restaurant at that time. It had a very modern, airy feel to it which I loved! The menu looked rather exotic to us but we managed to find something that sounded good: chicken katsu curry, which was chicken breast deep-fried in panko breadcrumbs, served with a curry sauce and sticky white rice. Manuel had the same only with grilled chicken breast instead of deep-fried.





For dessert, I went with the coconut reika (three scoops of dairy coconut ice cream topped with a fresh, tangy mango sauce and toasted coconut flakes). I’d seen a picture of this dessert in Sharon’s trip report and just knew I had to get it! It was delicious.



Manuel had mango with lime zest and lychee sorbet, which was ok, he said, and some coffee.

Around 4:30pm, we took the Piccadilly tube line to Green Park station and switched to the Jubilee line to get to Bond Street station. Our first stop was, of course, the Disney Store!


I love the Dalmatians.

We then walked up Oxford Street (one of London’s main shopping streets). It was very crowded and it started raining. We went into one of the many huge department stores to use the bathroom and buy two picture frames. Afterwards, we walked down Regent Street (more little boutiques) and found a Subway where we got some chocolate chip cookies and sat down a while. When we got back out, it was pouring down! We walked straight to Oxford Circus station and took the tube to Waterloo station.









The tube is really far down underground, as you can see by the long escalators:




At Waterloo station, it was still pouring down. We could see the London Eye a few hundred yards away from where we left the station. However, it was only a little after 7pm, and we weren’t to meet Cheryl and Mark at the Eye till 8pm, so we found a nice little Starbucks. Manuel got some coffee while I went for a tasty mango-passion fruit smoothie. Hmmmm!





I was glad I could rest my back for a while because it was really starting to act up. After almost an hour of just sitting around in those comfy armchairs, we made our way to the Eye to wait for Cheryl and Mark. Cheryl sent me a text that they were looking for a parking spot and just needed to walk up afterwards. They arrived around 8:20pm, after having a hard time finding a parking spot. Due to the rainy weather, there was no line to get onto the Eye – which I was eternally thankful for! Oh, I just realized I never explained what the Eye is! The London Eye is Europe’s biggest ferris wheel. We were in a capsule with just 6 other people, which was awesome. Cheryl said that the last time they were on the Eye, it was on a sunny day in the middle of the summer, and they were squished into a capsule with like 30 people or so?


Big Ben!


I was glad there was a bench in the middle of the capsule! The following pictures are pretty self-explanatory



















It was so great to see Mark and Cheryl again! However, they were obviously both not feeling too well, and honestly, by this time, I was exhausted myself. It had been one long day! Cheryl and Mark offered to give us a ride back to our hotel – which we happily accepted! So we walked to their car together along the river Thames.





Their Skoda car was very comfy and roomy! And the drive through London at night was amazing. We saw so much of the city! We only used the tube to get around the rest of the time, and just like the Eurostar drives too fast through the Chunnel to see the fishes, the tube drives too fast to see the sights of London, right?


This is a nighttime shot of the London Eye.


We tried to take lots of pictures during the drive back to the hotel but unfortunately, most of them are just blurry. This one of Harrod’s turned out ok.

We said goodbye to Mark and Cheryl when we got back to our hotel, thanking them for the lovely ride. It was 10pm at that time, and since we had been up for 20 hours, we just crashed as soon as we were back in our hotel room.

Next: What do you mean he couldn't find his passport???

[chezp]

Thanks for the reminder of a wonderful evening - I was so glad that we both made it up to see you, even if we weren't in the best of states. It was well worth the effort of getting there, as we had a great time.

Love your comment about the Tube going too fast to see the sights of London.

I'll have to see if I can find a few of our photos to add to yours...

[chezp]

Ok, I've uploaded a few photos that will hopefully compliment yours - I've deliberately tried not to replicate the ones you got.

First off, some photos of the modern art along the Embankment, as we walked up to the Eye:




In the last shot, you can see me walking along. I know I was using the Wimbledon umbrella as a walking stick.

Now some shots from the Eye:




Looking over to Charing Cross with the Hungerford Bridge in the foreground and Cleopatra's Needle to the right of the shot

The view along the Embankment - mainly government buildings, with the RAF Memorial on the river in front

Close-up of Buckingham Palace....

.. and Big Ben

Looking east over one of the capsules behind us

To the right, you can see Waterloo station and, at the top of the shot, the Gherkin!

Looking south

And to the west - the building to the left is the former County Hall, now home to the London Bridge

A view down the River Thames

The building to the left is Portcullis House, our new home to MPs offices that cost a fortune to build

As we walked back to the car, we got a few more photos:

The lights were just coming on for Big Ben...

... and now they were coming on for the rest of the Houses of Parliament

Finally, a few (not so good) shots on the way to Sabine and Manuel's hotel:


Houses of Parliament

Westminster Abbey

Wellington Arch at Hyde Park Corner

It was a truly great night.