UK Trip – July 12 – 21, 2024
Over the past 30+ years, my better-half has put her nature aside and followed me on some journeys, personal and professional, that she’d probably rather have skipped. I decided it was high time for some payback. Working up our calendar for 2024, I asked Kathleen to take the lead in planning a trip to London. There’d be no motorcycles involved and I’d do whatever I was told. Boy did she deliver.
Friday, July 12, 2024
Day two in London. Summary so far. After about an hour of sleep on the plane, we arrived at Heathrow at around 6:30 am. Used the Bolt App to get to our digs in Kensington. Driver Mohamed couldn’t have been more nice, or more patient. Originally from Pakistan, he’d lived in Germany before settling in London. He was very well travelled and had spent time in NYC and DC, preferring DC. He asked about our election and I shared that our country is split down the middle. Said he loves the US even though his native country has issues. Sights of the day included a walk through the serene Holland Park, toured and learned about the artists of the area and Leighton House, and a tour of the Royal Albert Hall. Tour guide James, was terrific. Looked like Doogie Howser and gave us the scoop on all the diversity of events and entertainers who’ve graced the iconic venue. Everything from boxing to opera to concerts of all styles, entertainers from the Beatles & Stones, to Popes and tennis stars. Eric Clapton has the record number of appearances. Dinner was at a local Persian restaurant, fantastic lamb stew for me, lamb skewers for Kathleen, with tea and baclava for dessert. Found a couple super cool local grocers on the walk home.
Got some over-priced local cash as a souvenir that no one accepts for payment.
After a solid night’s sleep, we hit the road early. Got our first taste of the Tube, and started out with a walk to Tower Bridge, which most confuse for London Bridge. Grabbed an excellent breakfast on Saint Katherine Docks before heading to Tower Hill, a built by the Norman, William the Conqueror, and took in a self-guided tour. Saw and got the back-story of the Crown Jewels and all the Palace intrigue associated with King Henry the 8th and his wives. Crazy Medieval bastards! Next up, St. Paul’s Cathedral. Truly breathtaking! Rebuilt in the Baroque style after the original Gothic church was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. Some highlights from there were the iconic Burrough Market, unfortunately discovered after we took in a subpar meal. Next up was Leadenhall Market, dating back to the 14th century, we grabbed some coffee and a little “sweets” before hitting the Sky Garden to check out the city from 36 stories up. It was a big day, 20,000+ steps and nearly 10 miles. We were beat as we took the tube back to Earl Court and walked the last mile to our flat.
Tuesday, July 16, 2024
Short notes. Next day. (Saturday) Westminster Abbey and saw Ed Carpenter tomb. Walked by Buckingham Palace and saw the guards. On our way to Trafalgar Square, we were treated to a full military review which included a marching band performing a wreath laying ceremony for some Dutch dignitaries. Tons of walking which included stops at Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus (brief encounter with an unsuccessful pick-pocket), before we grabbed some fabric for Aunt Lizzie at Liberty. Finished up with Fat Tire London Bicycle Tour with Daniel. Neat guy, hugely knowledge, he grew up in Italy with summers in NYC. Moved to London. Saw a lot of familiar sites and got lots of back-story. Lloyds of London Sci-Fi building. Bad-ass Queen Boudica led the revolt that killed all the Romans. Grabbed a beer at Leadenhall Market and met the nice French family on the custom-made wooden bicycles.
(Sunday). Another big day of walking and tours. Museum of Natural History, geared towards the kids with lots of dinosaur skeletons; Victoria and Albert Museum, spectacular art exhibit and moldings of ancient statues and building from the ages all around the western world; and got in a delicious lunchtime Sunday Roast before hitting the Churchill War Room. Interesting venue, it reminded me of the bunker under Gibraltar. Biggest take-away from Churchill was that he started out a liberal and did a lot for the working man including pension and living wage legislation, and that he didn’t become Prime Minister until age 65. One contemporary noted that from a political success standpoint, prior to becoming PM, his successes pretty much equaled his failures. Finally, we took the Uber Boat from downtown to the Battersea Power Station. Made famous by Pink Floyd’s Animals album, it was super interesting and we grabbed an excellent strip steak dinner at a wine bar. The menu was virtual and believe it or not, I couldn’t get the app to work properly. Took the walk of shame to our server at the bar and when I apologized for being old, she said it wasn’t my fault, the app is “a dickhead!” I love the English. It was the night of the big Futbol match between London and Spain and on our walk back to our flat from the train, we peeked inside a massively packed pub of rowdy fans and took a quick video on my phone. Unfortunately for London, the underdogs couldn’t pull it off.
(Monday). Started early again, walked to the bus station and took a 1 ½ hour ride to Windsor Castle. Bought the London Times and read it on the way. Trump had been shot the day prior so there was a bunch on that. Very cool visit to the castle and got to wear our rain jackets. Lunched at a Moroccan restaurant in Windsor, might have been the best meal of the trip to date, and “most importantly, healthy” as our super nice host shared. Took the train to Richmond and walked the waterfront and park before grabbing a drink at Ted Lasso’s favorite bar, “The Prince’s Head”. Dinner was delicious gelato on the way to the train station.
“It’s the differences.” Way out vs Exit, Take Away vs Takeout, Mind the Gap/Your Head/Whatever, Any food allergies or annoyances? To those who say the food is no good here…you’re not trying. You can have your Fish and Chip, bangers & mash, and blood pudding. But this place is a melting pot. Some of our best meals came from Middle East and North African restaurants. Syria, Lebanon, Iran and Morocco. Their home governments might be less than desirable, but the folks over in the UK were wonderfully welcoming and couldn’t have been any nicer. The coffee…Flat White was our favorite. Double shot of Espresso topped with whole milk and a light froth. Perfect. It took me a couple days to NOT feel guilty about not tipping. I told the adorable server at the gelato shop in Richmond that I wasn’t going to pay her if she wouldn’t accept a gratuity, but she made a liar out of me.
Tuesday, July 16, 2024
We checked out of our flat in Kensington for the second part of our vacation, a few days in the Roman city of Bath. We Uber’d to the train station and once again, had an experience with the driver. A friendly and handsome young man originally from Ethiopia, I asked about his family. He and his wife have two young daughters who are good kids and enjoy school. I noticed a Cross hanging from his rearview mirror but chose not to bring up his spirituality. I wish I had. After just over an hour, our train pulled into the Bath Spa station and we took the short walk to our new digs, right in the center of town, it was on the third floor with an incredible view of the cathedral. Besides the stunning Georgian architecture, relatively modern and NOT Roman, it is named for the stone from which most of the buildings are built, the other living feature of this city is most definitely the Gulls. Noisy and huge, these suckers dominate the skies and streets. I loved it, had a Cape Cod sound to it. We dropped off our luggage and hit the town for a walk, choosing a 3-mile track along the Kennet & Avon Canals that Kathleen had previously scouted. So cool…nothing like I’d ever seen. The canals are filled with Narrow Boats that many use as primary or vacation dwellings. As we walked past the many locks, we tried to imagine how they operated. Unlike the locks on the Cape Cod canal that I’d seen as a kid, these things were manual, hand cranked jobs, hundreds of years old but I imagined still working as they had from the beginning. I didn’t have to “wonder” for long. We came upon Paul, the Captain of a Narrow Boat, who was on his own, doing the work better suited for a pair. Of course, I joined him and got a lesson for my efforts. We used a manual hand-crank to work the windlass, one of which raised or lowered the water, the other opened or closed the huge wooden “gates”. Behind Paul’s regal looking craft was a “Beverly Hillbilly’s” model. It was an old, motorless, craft with a small cabin, very rough and painted purple all around. We’d talked with the owner a few minutes prior, who shared that just a day or two before, he picked up his craft for one thousand pounds. He’d found himself home-less, didn’t expand other than sharing it was not “drugs”, and this was the most interesting of his present options. His propulsion was a pair of oars, attached by rope oarlocks, but he had design on an affordable used motor. We finished our walk and grabbed some Thai before calling it a night.
Thursday, July 18, 2024
Bath is so beautiful. It is graduation week here and there are so many beautiful young future professionals walking proud and happily through this gorgeous city with their parents and people special to them. It got me and Kathleen both thinking how the world is going to turn out just fine. Day one (a couple days back,)
Yesterday (Wednesday) was a busy day. After a quick bite, we took the Bad of Bath tour, led by Simon, a cheerful, funny and knowledgeable local who led our group through the city for a few hours and shared some of the more scandalous aspects of life and its history. Crime, sex, corruption, gambling, and even the hazards of working in the bath houses were covered. We had a nice group of folks from a young attractive couple recently engaged, a young single woman from Shanghai, several from Australia including an older couple (probably our age!) who were going to rent a Narrow Boat and spend some time on the canals later in the week. We followed it up with a trip to the Bath House. It was a nice 2 hours of rejuvenating soaks starting on the roof terrace and working our way down through the steam, sauna, and “space” room, before a last soak in the lower pool. Grabbed a quick shower then hit a pub for a couple pints of Fuller’s Ale (awful!) before catching our self-guided tour of the ancient Roman Bath House. Afterwards, not wanting to waste the 15 minutes before our dinner reservation, we took a quick walk through the Guild Hall and the old Topping & Co. bookstore. Thank goodness for a funny book title featuring the word “Beaver”. Searching for my camera to snap a pic to send to my brother Jay, I realized I’d left my phone at Guild Hall, which closed a couple minutes prior. We ran like OJ through the airport and I found my way into an entrance in the rear, got to the coffee shop where the nice woman was holding my phone. Next up was the best dinner of the trip so far, down in the basement, we hit the Yak Yeti Yak, a wonderful Nepalese restaurant that turned us away (no reservations) the previous evening. It was absolutely delicious, the waitstaff were so nice, and Asia-respectful (bowing and the like). I had a nice chat with a man named Yashi about my upcoming trip in October. He’s a motorcyclist himself and told me his boss has a BMW and rides Nepal every year on a Royal Enfield. He asked if I had a YouTube channel and I told him I’d commit to doing that since he asked. Once again, we chose to walk off our meal with a hike to some high ground to see the city from above. It was the perfect way to close out the day, getting in another 20,000 steps, before getting back to the room for a toddy and YouTube videos to plan the next day.
Thursday, July 18, 2024 (late)
Another excellent day that had its challenges, but that’s what makes life an adventure. Today was the day we were renting a car and heading to the country. Initially it was going to be Stonehenge and the Cotswold’s, but after looking at the timeline realistically, we made some adjustments. Grabbed a nice breakfast to start. Kathleen, leery of what eggs have been doing to her constitution, went all Oliver Twist and got a big bowl of English porridge. I went traditional and added smoked Scottish salmon to my eggs. We Uber’d to Enterprise Rental to pick up our wheels, where they pulled a Seinfeld on us. Took our reservation but didn’t hold it. Good news is we got an upgrade to a beautiful black Mercedes C car and hit the pavement for Stonehenge’s lesser-known sister, Avebury. IT had all the qualities attractive to tourists like us. It’s bigger than Stonehenge, yes, size matters, much less crowded, and there’s a restaurant and pub smack dab in the middle of the “park”. We’d also get to lay our mitts directly on the stones, verboten at Stonehenge. We were very happy with our choice. The drive was something else. As we’ve done for 30+ years of marriage, Kathleen started out in the driver’s seat. Issue was, you might not know, the English drive on the “other” side of the road, and as such, the car’s steering wheel is on the right making for an entirely different experience. Add in the fact that traffic started out very heavy, we began the journey with a rare shouting match which ended with Kathleen pulling over and us switching seats. It all worked out and though we had a very near fender bender early on, we pulled off an uneventful driving day and made-up as the hours passed. While walking the rocks, we met a sweet if not odd couple. She could have been Susan Harrell’s younger sister, from somewhere in OH. Her partner was the sweetest man of about the same age, from Liverpool. After walking among the rocks and sheep, grabbing a couple beers at the pub mid-walk, and an ice cream at the end, we hit the road for Castle Combe, a little hamlet on the southern end of the Cotswold’s. It was a very quaint, J.R. Tolkien-esque hamlet and we were able to check a block off our trip’s bucket list. Dinner back in Bath was delicious. Traditional British fare at the Raven, stew for me, Beef and Ale pie for Kathleen. Next up was our new traditional post-meal walk, this time back up and past the iconic Crescent before bringing it back home to chill out over a bourbon. We head back to London in the morning.
Saturday, July 20, 2024
Friday. We grabbed a delicious breakfast at a little café tucked cozily inside an old building across from the Raven. For the first time on the trip, even the music was fitting. Classic British rock versus the typical techno-jazz fusion that seemed to be piped everywhere. We checked out of the flat and hit the train back to London. The weather had changed dramatically, and we found ourselves pulling into Slough with temps in the mid to upper 80’s. We noticed very quickly how the environment changed to the other end of the “posh” spectrum. Our digs, The Ostrich Inn, has been around for a VERY long time…the 1100’s to be exact. It had character for sure, and an odd aroma that comes from age, a lively bar, and wood-burning fireplace. Did I mention it was hot. Of course, there was no A/C and our room on the second floor was miserably hot. First world problem. Chalk this up to, “It’s a small world.” Grabbing a beer and bite downstairs, a young couple with two teenage boys was checking in and I noticed an Alabama ball cap attached to their luggage. Dan and his fam were from Dothan, Alabama and at the end of a big trip that included a cruise to Denmark. There wasn’t much to the town but after changing into shorts, we walked Colnbrook from end to end and got in our 20,000 steps. Had a nice Thai dinner, got back to our hot and steamy room, and fell asleep watching Netflix on my laptop…the Telly was also on the fritz.
Saturday. Our last full day before departure. Grabbed a nice breakfast and met a lovely retired college professor from Cambridge who shared that she once lived in Nottingham, Robin Hood’s town. Told us we need to visit Cambridge on our next go around. Had some light and fun conversation with Cherry, our server who we met at check-in yesterday. Took our first Double Decker Bus ride back into London to meet up with some clients who’ve lived in the UK for the past couple of years. Sitting in the front seats was like riding a roller-coaster. We de-bussed in Mayfair, back on the high end of the “posh” scale. It was nice to be back in the big city after a couple days in suburbia. Walking to our meetup place, we heard some commotion that sounded like a New Orleans marching band. Turned out it was a parade celebrating “Falun Dafa”. It’s counterpart, “Falun Gong”, is banned in China and from what we could tell, this march was to bring awareness to that fact. Falun Dafa is a worldwide movement, a banner described “A Traditional Practice for Mind, Body, and Soul” with a mantra highlighting “Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance”. Sign me up. It was time for our rendezvous so we got out of the light rain that had begun to fall and hit the Ristorante Frescobaldi to meet up with the Palmertree’s. We had a really nice visit, first-time meeting for Kathleen, and spent more than 4 hours dining like Europeans. Appetizers, pasta, and 3 bottles of wonderfully tasty Chianti, Greg and Tamara did most of the talking. They’ve spent the past 12 years living all over the world and Greg has become quite a history buff. Coupled with his passion for metal detecting, it was an interesting and entertaining afternoon. From there, we went our separate ways. Kathleen and I spent another couple of hours in the hip Soho area. She finally found me a cool ballcap that met my criteria for purchase. The young cashier was from southern India, in university here studying business. We had a nice chat and I told him how much opportunity awaits him down the road because of his outgoing personality, which got me a discount on the hat! Believe it or not, we stopped to grab a bite at a really cool Sicilian Pizza joint, before busing and train-ing back to our digs at the Ostrich Inn where they were having a serious “funky reggae party”. We were exhausted and chose to skip the fun, actually sleeping through the last hour of the noisy affair.
Sunday, July 21, 2024
We woke up to learn our flight would be delayed by the crazy Crowdsource spectacle of the day before. We decided to take advantage of the extra 3 hours and headed back to Windsor, the nearest big town to Colnbrook. We met a very friendly woman at the bus stop, originally from the Goa area of India, and had a good talk about enjoying your money in retirement and not worrying about leaving your kids an inheritance. We’d been to the castle already so we mostly just walked the town, got in some steps, and killed time. Tiem was of the essence so we took a Bolt back to the Inn had yet another note-worthy encounter. Our driver as a super nice, very talkative semi-retired Indian man (originally from the Punjab area) who’d been in London for 47 years. Sweet man, driving a beautiful Mercedes similar to the one we rented, he told us of his extended family who live locally and his brother-in-law who lives in NY. He’s been to the States many times, his favorite stops so far are Chicago (even in the winter!) and NYC. To meeting friendly folks on our travels, we agreed that you tend to get what you put out there. We checked out of the Ostrich Inn and waited for our next Bolt experience. Masudur was our first Bangladeshi. Very nice, and very talkative in a more broken English manner than our friend from India. He talked of the importance of family and raising your children to not only be productive, but to be giving and helpful members of the community. His son will be attending University to study engineering and though he was prepared to fork out the cash for Oxford or Cambridge, he admitted to us that his son is a bit of a mamma’s boy and wants to live at home while going to school. During our 12 minutes together, he invoked God several times and how we are all here for a purpose. I later told Kathleen that if I was younger, I’d love to become a journalist and spend time travelling the world, doing short interviews with folks along the way and documenting them. We’re told that badness is everywhere but it’s amazing how prevalent “goodness” is and how easy it is to find if you get out and interact. At the airport, we got situated, found our gate and as we were early, decided to grab a quick bit and a drink. We made our way to a British café and ordered our last Beef & Ale Pie. I noticed a man at an adjacent table staring at me. I couldn’t tell if it was intentional or he was just in a daze, but when he walked off to visit the rest room, I chatted up his wife. I noticed his right arm was in a sling so I used that as an in. Turns out they were American. Coincidentally, they currently live in Stuart, Florida, and have been in the UK to support their daughter who’d just swum the English Channel! She is their badass middle child, a firefighter by trade, and extreme athlete by passion. A quick Google search brought the fascinating story of Marissa McAuliffe, who got into “extreme” swimming after a botched dental surgery in 2022 left her in near constant, and excruciating pain. The following year, pain more or less under control, she decided to focus on things that made her happy. Swimming happened to be one of those things. The English Channel is considered the “Mount Everest” of extreme swimming so that’s where she set her sights and trained appropriately. During the crossing, mom and dad captained the support boat where mom shared she cried for a good chunk of the journey. Bearing such close witness to her child’s stress and anguish was very emotional. Swimming for twenty-one miles in freezing cold, jelly fish infested, open water is unimaginable to nearly anyone, especially yours truly who almost met his match swimming one mile in an indoor pool for Navy training. But in the end, Marissa persevered…no guts, no glory was the order of the day and we were there, one week later, sharing the triumph in an airport café with her proud parents in London. What a world.
Monday, July 22, 2024
Our flight home was just over 9 hours long. A bad movie followed by a good one helped pass the time before we landed in Atlanta to learn that our connecting flight had been cancelled, along with hundreds of other flights. Delta airlines, and Atlanta Hartsfield Airport specifically, was ground zero for the software spectacle of a couple days prior. We joined hundreds of weary travelers finding space where we could to try and grab a little shut-eye and see what the next day would bring. Our total rest was measured in minutes, not hours, and very early the next morning, our Delta app said our flight back to PNS wouldn’t happen until the following morning. We are doers so of course, that wouldn’t do. I logged onto Expedia and booked us a rental car at around 4:30 am which we planned to pick up when Dollar Rental Car opened up at 7:30 am. Thankfully, it wouldn’t be needed as the same Delta app kept showing us new flight to PNS created almost super-naturally on the hour. We ended up catching an 8:30 am flight which had us back in Pensacola by 9:30, after the time change.
What a trip. From the beginning, it was all Kathleen. She did all the research, organized our days, booked our tours, and found our lodging. She was masterful. We had just enough scheduled each day to keep us on our toes, with enough slack baked in for a little breathing room and to get jiggy when the opportunity arose. By the end of the trip, we’d even figured out public transportation and did it all. Trains, planes, automobiles, boats, and bicycles. We skipped the motorcycle and honestly, I really wouldn’t have been comfortable, Kathleen even less so. This was mostly a city tour so maybe we’ll go horseback riding when we visit Ireland, and we’ll wait till China for the rickshaw. All in all, we found the UK an absolutely wonderful place to visit. The history, architecture, culture, and most importantly, the people. What a melting pot. And we always felt safe…I don’t remember one instance where I thought Kathleen was going to have to protect me! And being such a fan of classic British Rock and Roll and the lyrics of my favorites, to get to experience “from SoHo down to Brighton”, and walk where Warren Zevon’s hairy fellow “who ran amok in Kent”, who’s “lately been overheard in Mayfair”, was really special. Song after wonderful song were continually popping into my head and I did my best to share them with my beautiful partner and soulmate. If we had to pick a theme song for the entire trip, it would unquestionably be the Kinks classic, “Victoria”. We sang it to each other the entire time because, as we learned during our lunch with the Palmertree’s, “Toria”, as Ray Davies called her, was the driving force behind England’s colonialism and her presence was everywhere. It made us check out the lyrics to that happy, playful song and appreciate it and our trip even more. Final shout out to Collin and Sandy for carrying my water for two weeks. I can honestly say that I was never worried about things back home, they’ve got this gig down pat, and are as dedicated to our client family as their genetic family. It’s beautiful to witness and I am infinitely grateful.
