Rain? In London? Who'd a thought

Yep, rain, shitty weather, London!! I had a very boring day today, no tourist sights, no kind hunky strangers, nothing!! I spent the day shopping and people watching, which was actually fun, well the watching bit, I hate shopping!!!

I have been here 3 days and it has taken me that long to find a map, yep, 3 days... Everyone has maps of London, but I wanted one of England.. most of the store folk thought I was mental, though to be fair they were very kind, you know, to the mental lady!! They all had suggestions on where I might purchase one, I followed all there suggestions and like I said it has taken me 3 days!! But now I have one, and it is quite fun to sit and look at a map and think where shall I go, perhaps here, perhaps there?

I am heading out of London tomorrow if I can, I am kind of over it, it is way too big, today a local told me there are 25 million people in London!!!!!!! 25 million, we don't have that many in our whole country, which is way, way bigger. I am tossing up between Cambridge and Leicester, not sure yet, I shall go to the bus station and see what buses there are, then make my decision. You gotta love being free!

I am going to a dear friends on Monday to spend a day or two in Lincoln, so that will be lovely. She has very kindly offered me a bed. After that I am heading slowly up to Scotland, visiting the ancestral homes and villages. In Scotland I shall spend some time with another dear friend. I am very lucky to have such nice friends.

I have only just returned to the hotel, I shall now take a lovely refreshing shower to warm up. England is very cold, even though it is almost summer, it is still like I am home in Bendigo, freezing.......



It costs 50 to use a toilet in London, and there are time limits.. I have no idea what happens if your time runs out, I assume the door just opens and displays you to the watching world..I hurried as I didn't want to find out!! Above is a picture of the sink in the said toilet. As there are no instructions I shall teach you how to use it, notice there are no taps on the faucets. First you have to put your hand under the left side faucet and a little dribble of soap comes out, then a gush of water that thoroughly soaks you. Then as there is not hand drier, but you hear blowing air, you put your hand under the right hand faucet and it attempts to dry your hands. If you are ever in London, you will thank me for that, it was very confusing at first.



One of the things I like best about London is the little treasures hidden about the city. You can be walking along a street, full of boring skyscrapers you suddenly come across a little gem, like the pub above, how marvelous are those windows? I love that about London.



Another little Gem. How flash are those lights?



I took this yesterday, from the boat. This is the new way to build river frontage property to maximise the price you can charge, each apartment has a river view, hence is more expensive to buy. Rather clever and it looks good too, way better than a lot of the building on the waters edge.

Okay that's all for now

Cheers

Lones

London, Full of surprises...

Well another eventful day. it started early as jet lag hit me last night and I slept on and off from about 5pm to 4:30 am. By 4:30 I gave up trying to sleep and as it was light outside I decided to go for a walk. Well, the first person I meet outside the hotel is an armed policeman/guard... Not just your usual police handgun, this guy was seriously armed, looked like an assault rifle you see in the movies!! I was thinking "What happened!! I didn't hear anything". He was very polite, wished me good morning and everything. I wished him one back, I had no intention of upsetting him. I scuttled up the street, trying to appear nonchalant, when I noticed other armed police guarding a house in the square. I had a very short walk and asked the receptionist at my hotel what all the armed guards were about. She said they are always there, Tony Blair lives in the square!! So there you go, shitty hotel, but impressive neighbours. Not that the locals are all that impressed with the Blairs, see http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-494672/Blairs-throw-Christmas-bash-fed-neighbours.html

After breakfast I headed off to see more of London. I started by walking through Hyde park to the lake, then down along Buckingham Castle Gardens. I saw them on the map and thought they might be nice to visit. Believe me, I was nowhere near as eager to get in as they were to keep me out... They take their royal gardens very seriously here... see picture below.



Look at those spikes...

I thought better of the whole garden thing and headed south to visit Westminster Cathedral. Once again passing Buckingham palace. I took some more pics and as I was taking my photos I heard an American voice say "Those are the columns Cindy wants, one each side" She was pointing at the palace.. My first thougth was "What is Cindy buiding and how much money does she have?"...

By the time I got to the cathedral my feet were beginning to ache, once I reached Westminster Abby they were throbbing.... Note to self, next time buy the ugly comfortable shoes... seriously, they didn't look that bad!!

From Westminster Abbey I wandered down to the Houses of Parliament and found out Big Ben is not the clock tower, but the name of the bell inside the tower, the one that chimes the hour.. Yep interesting tit bit, but it probably won't change your life..

I then toddled down to the Thames and brought a ticket for 14 pounds 50 pence that allowed me to travel all day on the boats, getting off and on whenever I pleased... I thought that was rather good value. I took a boat down the Thames to the Tower of London. What a history filled place that is, rather tragic but interesting too. I then took another boat to Greenwich village. You know where time is taken!! I visited their market and wandered around the area. Quite a nice place. The boat captain pointed out the building that has a large T shape on the roof, there is a ball on the T and every day at 12:55 pm the ball lifts to the top of the T, then at exactly 1 pm it drops, it is how people can check that their timepieces are correct to Greenwich mean time, or you could just check the radio, that works too..

It was really good travelling on the boats, the captain gives a running commentary on many of the buidings and history of the river side. I travelled on several boats and all the captains did it, it made the trip really amusing and actually educational too. I also learned that London Bridge is dead boring, the Tower Bridge though is not. I always thought they were one and the same, but no, the Tower Bridge is the nice one. It very rarely is raised these days, but today we were fortunate enought to see it, a really tall yacht needed to come down river as we were there, so bingo, I have photo's..

By the time I had finished on the river my feet were insufferable. I made my way slowly home to the hotel. I have found the slippers my daughter threw in at the last minute and if I go out at all tonight, I'm wearing them!!

I shall pop some photo's at the bottom for you to see, I hope you enjoy them

Cheers

Lones


Palace Guard


Westminster Abbey


Houses of Parliament


Tower of London


Tower Bridge


The red ball at Greenwich village, you can bearly see it, but it's there..Right in the middle at the back of the pic. The red ball is at the bottom of the T part, I just missed the drop.

So it begins...

Hi Everyone

Well I finally left Melbourne at 2:55am on Wednesday morning, 26th May 2010. The flight took 26 hours with two stops, we had a 1:30 hour stopover in Kuala Lumper, but they only allowed us 20 minutes to ourselves and then we had to check in to reboard the flight. They say reboard, but they really mean 'shepard you into a lounge and make you wait'. We then had another stopover in Dubai, what an incredible place. I was watching the landscape out the window and I have never seen anything so baron, not even our outback... None of the homes outside the city of Dubai had any trees or shade at all, just little buildings stuck in the middle of a desert, it was amazing... You should Google Earth it, just to be amazed too.

I arrived at Heathrow at 8:08pm, London time, it was still light and remained so for quite a while, I loved that, I didn't have to find my bearings in the dark. I stayed at an hotel near the airport for my first night, as I didn't want to travel into London in the middle of the night, with all my luggage and no idea of where I was going.... Good plan, it worked out quite well. The Holiday Inn Arial was quite nice, decent price and their breakfast was to die for... It was help yourself, and I did!! I still wasn't hungry at lunch time, so there you are.

I took a train into town from Heathrow at about 7am this morning, so am now officially in London. I could not book into this hotel until 1:30 pm, so have been dragging my luggage around all day, I am surprised at how much I have seen this morning, considering I was dragging around about a ton of luggage. I know the airport in Melbourne told me it was 21.5 kilo's but I think their scale is incorrect as it is definitly nearer the ton... I know, I totted the thing around all morning. When I arrived in London at Piccadilly train station, I discovered that they do not actually have lifts in train stations, it was the funniest thing, like on the cartoons when someone looks up the stairs and they just keep growing, higher and higher, that is exactly how it was, I couldn't believe it, no lifts and me with 1 ton of luggage and no muscles!! I was in serious trouble when this lovely young man saw my predicament and said "Would you like a hand with that?", in the most adorable English accent... Well he had muscles, lots of them... mmmmm....

I have been to Trafalgar Square, St James Park, Buckingham Palace, Wellington's Arch, Hyde Park and Marble Arch already, not too bad for one morning. I am now in the new hotel, it has free wireless internet which is great, which is lucky, 'cause the rest of it is not that wonderful. I almost laughed out loud when I saw my room.. If you tried to swing a cat you would fracture the poor thing in several places. The worst part though is no lift, yep I know, I was looking at that 1 ton piece of luggage and then the stairs in horror!! Luckily the receptionist offered me a hand with my luggage and as she was young and fit and rents rooms on the first floor without an elevator to old ladies (I was feeling older by the minute) , I let her do it, no guilt at all...

So now I am about to have a nap (that's the old lady thing kicking in!!) then I shall go out and explore again, without the hinderance of all that luggage.

You will all be super suprised to know that my very first English purchase was a bottle of Coke.... I know I'm amazed too!! Mind you they are impossible to find cold, most of them are sold straight off the shelf...

As most of you will know I planned to give up smoking before my trip, well that didn't work out so well.... So I then decided to give up upon arriving in England, I brought my stop smoking patches with me and everything. Have you ever tried to open a stop smoking patch without scissors??? I have no sharp items on my person, they discouraged them at Tullamarine, so what can a person do? I shall have to find a shop and buy some scissors and then forge ahead with my plan of non smoking... bear with me, I shall post updates of how all that works out!

So that is all my news at present. I shall post some of my pics at the bottom of this post, so you can have a small look see at what I have done.

This is my first blog, I have no idea what I am doing, so I hope it works out properly, if not, please bear with me until I get it sorted.

Cheers for now, from London

Lones

Buckingham Palace

St James Park

Two of London's icons, Nelson's Column & a double decker bus

Europe at last

Hey everyone, I am finally leaving for my trip of a lifetime, well my second trip of a lifetime... 2am, 26th May I leave Melbourne for London. I cannot wait!! More to follow when I arrive

Cheers

Lones