London Oct 3-6, 2008

Since we were (un)fortunate to not make our last trip to London for my birthday, we decided it would be worth it to try again this weekend. Luckily, the last time (Friday Sept. 12) the flight was delayed for a fuel pump problem and Chearl and I bolted. This was fortunate in the respect that on the 14^th, Hurricane Ike came blowing through Cincinnati and knocked out the power for some 5 days. I can only imagine what the sitters would have done with the dogs and the food if we were not home.

Anyhow, in looking at the flights, there was not much going on overseas this weekend so Chearl and I listed out on Friday night returning Monday. This would give us two solid days in London without missing much on the home front.

Chearl was working until 5 this Friday so I took her into work in the morning and was going to pick her up at 5 and head over to the airport. I arrived shortly before 5 and we then headed to the airport through the rush hour traffic and managed to secure a spot in the employee parking lot. We then took the shuttle over to the airport and got our boarding passes for Delta 36 to London.

We were leaving from B8 so we bustled through security and then to the gate to await the departure. We left a couple of minutes early and we were seated in 5F and G and were informed before the flight that the “inflight entertainment systems” were not working. Well, that was fine with me. I tend to hardly listen or look at them anyway during the night on the flights over anyway. I believe that I had the chicken on the way over. It was not too bad.

We arrived at Gatwick pretty much on time and I went to get tickets for the Gatwick Express into town. I had intentionally made reservations at a hotel close to Victoria station so that we would (1) be centrally located and (2) would not need to rely on a cab to get us from point A to point B. I had reserved a room through Hotels.com at the St. James on Buckingham Gate Rd. This was just down the street from the St. Ermins and from what quite a number of people had told me before, it was not a bad place to stay. It is now owned by Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza.

We walked down Victoria Street until I found the little building (Trust) which is on an island between the St. James and St. Ermins and we turned north there to find the hotel. We sort of walked three sides of a square to get there, but I did not know which were the shortcuts at the time.

We checked into room 656 which was considerably smaller than what I was expecting but was comfy none the less. After dropping off Chearl to rest, I took the camera and went walkabout.

Saturday 10:20 to 1:05

I walked up to Westminster Abbey and then up to Trafalgar Sq. and Charing Cross, then to Piccadilly Circus and up Regent St. to try to take some photos of Golden Sq. which was featured in the book on cholera.

After browsing around the square for a minute or two, I went to take some photos of the Lord Snow again and then went to Carnaby Street on my way back to Regent St.

Discovering that my long sleeved shirt and wind shirt was NOT going to keep me totally warm, I stopped into a Brooks Brothers store and bought a nice light blue sweater which I quickly put on.

Now that I was slightly warmer, I walked down to Leicester Sq. noticing that The Swiss House was now totally leveled. From Leicester Sq. I headed back towards Trafalgar Sq., picked up a sandwich for Chearl at the Subway between Leicester Sq. and Trafalgar, and then headed down The Mall towards Buckingham Palace.

I turned into St. James’ Park about midway down and continued towards the St. James’ tube station that is not too far from the hotel.

After taking in the sandwich for Chearl, I figured that she was not about to arise from the bed so I changed over to the wide angle lens and headed out once again.

Saturday 1:15 to 2:20

I walked down Buckingham Gate towards the Palace and then into St. James’ Park once again. I walked up the northern pathway towards Horseguards and then walked through the gates towards Whitehall and then through towards Banqueting House and the Gurkha memorial towards the river. After reaching the river, I turned towards Parliament and headed only slightly across the bridge to get a picture of Parliament.

Then I returned to Westminster Abbey and took some rather nice shots of the Abbey with the fish-eye lens before returning to the St. James. I returned to lay down for a minute or so before heading out again to meet with Don, Sus and Grant for dinner.

Saturday 4:10 to Night.

I had been trying to call the AnaCapri using the number that the concierge had given me at the hotel and there was no answer. I had talked with Sus and she had come up with another number so she called and made the reservation for 7:30.

Chearl and I walked back to Victoria Station and took the tube to Piccadilly where we got off and headed north on Regent St. again to do wome window shopping. Chearl went into a store on Carnaby St. to find some Christmas ornaments and then we walked back to Piccadilly and took the tube to Baker St.

It had begun to rain a little heavier and we wanted to find a place to meet and have a drink before dinner, but Chearl and I decided to go into AnaCapri. We could not find an open bar relatively close to the restaurant and it was raining pretty good so we just went into the restaurant a little early and a few drinks ourselves while waiting for the Langfords to arrive.

We all had a nice dinner and then we bade our goodbyes and we were back in the Baker St. tube by 9:30 and at St. James (with a transfer at Embankment) by 9:45. A short walk back to the hotel put us in bed by about 10. It had been a long day.

Sunday October 5, 2008

We awoke to rain again. Chearl had brought an umbrella but I did not so this was not going to be the day for a long walk through the city.

WE began the day by heading to Victoria Station and grabbing breakfast at the Upper Crust and then we took the tube southwest towards South Kensington. Chearl wanted to try to spend some time at Harrods and I was sort of interested in seeing the V&A. So we got off at South Kensington and walked through the tunnel to the V&A arriving shortly after 11.

We stayed in the museum until about 12:45 and then walked back to the tube station through the tunnel (which we discovered was closed due to flooding (???) and took the Piccadilly line to Knightsbridge where we got off and headed to Harrods.

It seemed as if almost everyone else in London had picked today to go to Harrods so needless to say, it was very crowded. We walked through all of the floors and did not buy a thing. I even looked for the little chocolates but could find none (more on this later).

We decided to pick up some food at Victoria Station and take it back to the room. Chearl had another sandwich from Upper Crust and I got a pasty and (should we all say it together!) Fanta and we retired to room 656 around 2:30 for the feast.

Chearl decided that she was going back to sleep and since the rain had let up a little, I decided to go walking again.

Sunday 3:30 to 5:15

I left the hotel about 3:30 and walked back to St. James’ Park and then headed towards the arch but decided to walk past St. James’ Palace trying to find the Cavendish Hotel that I had wanted to stay in. I walked towards Trafalgar Square on Pall Mall past St. James’ Square. The rain had pretty much died by this time and was brisk but not too bad.

At Trafalgar, I detoured down Northumberland St. towards Embankment past the Sherlock Holmes Pub and then across the river a little after 4 p.m. via the Hungerford foot bridge. I walked past the London Eye and then over the Westminster Bridge addiving back at Parliament Sq. at about 4:30.

From here I decided to walk down Victoria St. towards Victoria Station just to see what was there. I wanted to go past the Mews, but I also wanted to see what was available along this street.

I walked past the Albert Tavern at about 4:45 and then past the Cathedral a few minutes later finally arriving at Victoria shortly before 5. Then I rounded the corner onto Buckingham Palace Rd. and took some pictures of the Rubens before arriving back at the St. James around 5:15. Not a bad little walk.

We remained in the room until about 6:45 when we left to go find some dinner. I had thought that dinner in Chinatown again would have been fun so I grabbed the camera and the fish eye lens and we headed out. We walked to the St. James tube stop and took that to Embankment changing to the Northern Line towards Leicester Sq.

We walked to Gerrard St. arriving for dinner at the Lido around 7:15. I had some pork dish and Chearl had chicken and after about an hour we were back on the streets again. We walked over to Piccadilly Circus where I had wanted to take some night pictures of the lights there and then back to Leicester Sq. and down towards Charing Cross. Since we were not too far away and would have had to change trains anyway at Embankment, we just walked the rest of the way to the tube stop arriving a little after 9. We took the District or Circle line train back to St. James and the hotel

Monday Oct. 6, 2008

Our flight left about 10:30 so I wanted to be on the trail by 7:30 at the latest. We had stopped last night at Embankment and bought some orange juice for the morning and we had some muffins left over from yesterday. We forgot about all of this and did not remember it until we were out of the door.

We were early. I guess we left the hotel by a little after 7 and had no difficulty making our way with our bags to Victoria Station. We already had our tickets for the Gatwick Express so we just climbed on board and within 10 minutes the train had left the station for the short 30 minute trip to Gatwick.

We arrived at Gatwick and most, if not all, of the escalators were still being serviced. It was not very easy to get from one level to the next. We did manage to finally make it to the check in level and waited for a couple of minutes in the line before being greeted by the security people. This was not a big hassle.

We got our passes for the flight and then headed through security. Still not a large deal. We made it through and headed immediately for Harrods where I found the little chocolate discs which are not in the same wrappings as before. This might account for us not finding them at the main store yesterday. We bought some more tea and then headed for a place to sit.

We waited for our flight and then headed down to gate 52. When we got there, I asked the man at the security podium whether the standby people were still required to sit in the comfortable window seats and he replied to the affirmative. We then headed over to the floor by the window when a DL person came over and asked if we were the McGraths. I replied that we were and wondered how she knew our names and she replied that “we were the only two standby people on the flight today and we were the only ones that appeared to be ‘hovering’”. That was the last nice thing to happen to the same two standby people for the rest of the flight.

We ended up in 1F and 1G with 19 seats open for the ride home. Why some people think that the bulkhead seats are great is beyond me. I do not like them one bit..

The lead girl came around asking what we would like for lunch and she did not hesitate to inform us that they were out of almost everything. OK. We’ll wait and have a meal at snacktime. I slept quite a bit of the time and when we awoke for the snack, she made no bones of being out of almost everything again. OK. Not a huge deal since it is costing the company money. Whatever you can spare will be fine with me.

Then came customs. Since we were the first people off of the first flight of the day, we got tagged for this weird “Agriculture Survey” again. It is not really a huge deal, but once you get off the plane you really don’t feel like screwing around with these folks. Just hand them the card and move on, I say.

Noooooo… We have to go through this inspection before we have to have our carry on re-inspected by the TSA just to go get our car!

It was not that much of a deal, but I get angry every time I return to the states.

It was a nice trip anyhow.