We arrived at the Kings Crossing Station in London early on
Friday evening, August 19th.
Things were busy as we moved through the subway with our luggage to the
London School of Economics where we were to stay for the next four days. We were hungry, but wanted to drop off our bags
first. We found the Holborn Hall
(located a couple blocks from the Holborn subway station) and checked in. Our room was large, with three beds and a
bath and we shared a kitchen with four other rooms. Spartan, but clean and very convenient and at
$120 a night, a real deal as hotels in this neighborhood would have cost three
or four times this amount. The room also
included a wonderful buffet breakfast!
We had noticed a grocery store across from the subway
station, so we decided we’d head down and get pasta and food that Caroline can
easily eat with her “no-diary” needs. However, once we got there, we found that they had
closed at 8 PM and was going to be closed for a month as they remodeled. So we set out to find another store. After walking a few blocks, we saw a pair of
police officers and approached them, figuring they could direct us. They couldn’t! They laughed and sheepishly admitted they
weren’t even from London. As the city
had been rocked in riots ten days earlier, they’d been brought into the city
from another part of England. They
admitted their main purpose was to walk around and “make a presence.” They told us where they thought they’d seen a
small store and we headed in that direction.
I felt like a king as Caroline insisted on holding my hand. We eventually found a small store and brought
food. On the way back to our room, we
stopped at a fast food place, ran by Middle Easterners and brought dinner as it
was going to be too late to fix a meal.
This was my first time to have fast-food lamb ribs, but they were good
(Donna had chicken) and we all had fries.
The next morning, we took the subway to High Street Kensington
Station where we met Todd, Donna’s cousin, and set off on a walking tour through
London. Todd works for an American
company out of their London’s office and knows the city well. We walked through Kensington Gardens and Hyde
Park, stopped for photos at Buckingham Palace, then through St. James Park and
by 10 Downing Street, headed up into the theater district where we had lunch
and tried to wait out an afternoon shower.
After lunch, we headed toward Big Ben and walked around the Parliament
building and then on to Westminster Abbey and Westminster Cathedral. Instead of touring the Abbey, we toured the
Cathedral (and I went up the tower) and then headed back to the Cathedral in
time for the 5 PM Evensong Service. The service was beautiful and the sounds of
the organ and the choir filled the sanctuary.
Afterwards, Donna and Caroline decided they wanted to go with Todd to
see the play “Wicked.” Not wanting to
come up with another $150 for a ticket to see a play that I was only marginally
interested in, I decided to skip the play and to explore the city on my own.
Instead of the theater, I continued walking, checking out
again Parliament and then the Victorian Tower Gardens before crossing the Lambeth
Bridge and heading up the Thames, passing by the London Eye, before crossing
back over the river and back toward the London School of Economics. Knowing my evening was a chance to eat what I
wanted, I headed to an Indian Restaurant I’d seen a few blocks from where we
were straying. The “Punjab” advertises
to be the oldest “North Indian” restaurant in the city. It opened in 1946 (India was then still a
part of the British Empire). The place
is run by Sikhs and the food was wonderful.
Again, I had lamb (this time spicy), wonderful bread and vegetables
along with a large bottle of Cobra Beer imported from Bangalore (which isn’t
North India, I realized as I read on the bottle where it was brewed).
Sunday was a rather lazy day as Donna and Caroline had
stayed out late with Todd. Late in the
morning, we took a boat up the Thames River to Kew Gardens. Getting off the boat, we got to see a Cricket
match as we walked over to the Gardens.
We ate lunch in the Gardens and walked around the grounds, but mostly
spent time within the buildings that had lilies (the super-sized lilies that had
pie pan shaped leaves that were a meter across were neat) and tropical plants
(especially orchids). We took the train
back late in the afternoon and ate dinner before returning to our room. For some reason, I was in a down mood most of
the day and never really got into the gardens even though they were
beautiful.
East Coast Line at York |
We all got up early on Monday morning. Donna and Caroline planned to go to Wimbledon
and then meeting Todd for some evening shopping and dining. Having just taken the train from Southeast
Asia to Europe, I had wanted to visit the Rail Museum in York and we’d decided
this was the best day for me to accomplish this. After breakfast, I headed to the subway and
back to King’s Crossing Station where I caught a northbound East Coast Line train. Two hours later, after riding through the
rolling country of freshly cut grain, I arrived in York.
The National Rail Museum is free and
supposedly the largest railroad museum in the world. It is very impressive, but I am not sure that
it’s the largest railroad museum. The Sacramento
seemed to be just as large, but it’s been a quarter of century since I’ve been
there. The museum is located just to the
west of the station, which makes it convenient to those who arrive by
rail. I spent most of the morning and
half of the afternoon in the museum, stopping for lunch in their café. Although the focus is on British rail, there
is the engine of a Japanese Bullet Train on display as well as a large steamer
from the Chinese (but it was built in Britain in the 30s). The museum houses a working replica of the
Rocket, one of the oldest steam engines and the first to use tubes in the boiler
to enable it to develop more steam. The
royal family’s collection of elegant cars is also on exhibit at the museum. Probably the most sought after engine on
display is the Flying Scotsman, a Pacific type locomotive that was built to run
non-stop between London and Edinburgh.
The engine came with an oversized tender to give it the water and fuel
capacity to make the run without refueling or taking on water. This was also the first train to break the
100 miles per hour speed barrier and it gained even more fame as it was also
the name of the first British “talking film.”
The bottom of this wall was built by the Romans |
Tuesday was our last day in London. After breakfast and checking out of our room
and storing our luggage, we headed across the Thames to the London Eye, a large
Ferris Wheel on the Thames. It was
raining, which meant we didn’t have the best views but we also didn’t have to
wait long in line. The Ferris Wheel
consists of a number of carriages in which 20 or so people are packed in. Each carriage rotates as the wheel slowly
makes the revolution, so that you’re always level. It was interesting seeing the city in the
rain, but I’m sure it would have been better in the sunlight or at night. After the Eye experience, we went to a nearby
restaurant where I had the pleasure of eating the most overpriced food served
with the least amount of service on my whole trip. For
sixty some pounds, I had fish and chips (which was getting cold by the time the
malt vinegar arrived), Donna had chicken strips and cheese sticks or something
similar and Caroline had a plate of plain paste. Donna and I had hot tea to drink, which was
served after we’d complained several times and had finished eating our food. I suppose it took them a long time to boil
the water as the tea bags were placed in our drinks as they served them. At least the place was inside and out of the
rain. I could only imagine what the
service would have been like if it had been busy. Needless to say, I did something I seldom do
and left no tip.
After lunch, we took a boat up the Thames to Greenwich
Village. It was nice to sit inside and see
the sights through windows dotted with drops of water. The boat included a narration and we saw
where Shakespeare’s Globe Theater recreation and a number of pubs and bars
frequented by famous people. We learned
about the shipping and the various market areas within the city and other
tidbits of history like where they mounted the heads of criminals after their
execution. At Greenwich, we walked up
the hill to the Royal Observatory.
There, we got to straddle the 0 degree longitude line and see the
various telescopes and other implements of measurement used not only to tell
time but to map the world. The highlight of the Observatory was an actor
who played a number of characters as he told the story of the Observatory and
the role it played in developing a way to determine one’s position on the face
of the earth, a necessary skill for a country of seafarers like England. I had hoped to see the “Cutty Shark” that’s
moored at Greenwich. It’s the famous
ship that gave its name to Lyndon Johnson’s preferred scotch and was also the
last and one of the most famous clipper ships, but it was closed for
renovations. The ship was being restored
in 2007 and a fire at that time badly damaged the ship to where it requires
even more extensive restoration. All the
masts are down and we could only see a bit of the bow and stern over the solid
construction fence surrounding the ship.
We took the boat back up the Thames, getting off near
Shakespeare Globe Theater and crossing the Thames on a bridge and walking back
to Holborn by St. Paul’s Cathedral (we never got inside of it). Retrieving our luggage, we headed to the subway
and on to Kings Crossing Station where we had sandwiches for dinner as we waited
on the train to Dover. We arrived in Dover at 9:00, PM, took a cab to our
hotel. The next morning, everyone slept
in but me as I walked around the town, picking up a few items in a grocery
store for our journey. At 11 AM, we took
a cab to the wharf where Holland America’s Eurodam was moored and boarded. The
hotel lobby was packed and it seemed everyone was heading for the ship.
The port of Dover is a busy shipping terminal (especially
for passenger ships as ferries constantly leave for France (which we could see
from the top deck of the Eurodam) and other points in Europe. The white cliffs of Dover make a nice
backdrop of the port. Late in the
afternoon of August 24, after a lifeboat drill, we set sail for Amsterdam. The
Eurodam would be our home for the next seventeen days.
The White Cliffs of Dover and the lighthouse at the jetty |