If this is Sunday, It must be London...
If this is Sunday, It must be London...
Sunday morning began well enough... We did go to the restaurant for our complimentary buffet breakfast early and thus avoided most of the kids. This may have been aided by the fact that if the kids behaved too badly, the parents may not have taken them to LegoLand! Also, the kids would have been rested and, therefore, exhibited reasonable behavior...
The typical English breakfast must have survived from the more barbaric days in Briton... Much of the food was highly salted and full of fat! And who in their right minds eats baked beans or blood pudding for breakfast? Fortunately, I could each the scrambled eggs (which seemed to have been made from powdered eggs), fresh fruit, yogurt and wheat toast. Overall, it was an adequate starter meal within my dietary plan.
After breakfast, we traveled to Heathrow to catch the 'tube' to London's Paddington Station. Unlike the day before, we did not go by taxi; we road the 'Hotel Hoppa' shuttle bus that can by the hotel every half hour. This cost only £3 each, considerably less than the previous cab ride. It did take a little longer, but the driver was extremely courteous and helped get my walker aboard. We got to Heathrow and then the adventure began...
On the weekend that we were there, the Paddington line was closed for repairs and we got to take the faster 'Heathrow Express' train to the station for the same price of £6 each (round trip). The challenge, however, was to get to both the tube station and then to the Heathrow Express station. We walked down long corridors to each and the total trip took about one half hour.
Once on the train, the fifteen minute trip was quite pleasant and we were at the Paddington Station rather quickly. When we explored the station, we found no elevators or escalators by which we could reach street level. Our only options were to use the stairs or go up a long sloping street (about a quarter of a mile in length), which we did. Upon reaching the street level, we needed to then find the tour bus stop. After about five minutes of checking, we saw one of the buses (that has 'get on/get off' service around the city) pull away from the stop. We then made our way to that place, bought our tickets, and waited for the next bus...
The 'tour' bus runs on three lines: the Blue, the Red and the Green lines. We were at the stop on the Blue line... Immediately, this area looked familiar; we had stayed at a small bed and breakfast hotel a couple of blocks away (NOTE: a dreadful experience that we did not want to repeat), so we had a 'handle' on what we needed to do... We would take this Blue bus to the Marble Arches and transfer to a Red bus that would take us about the city center.
[By the way, the Blue route goes around the west side of the city, including Buckingham Palace and Herrods while the Red bus goes around the middle of the city, including the Themes, Tower Bridge, Tower of London, and other points of interest. The Green bus goes into the northern portion of the city, including the British Museum.]
Thank goodness I had taken the walker instead of the wheelchair since it was much better adapted to getting on and off the bus. It allowed me to walk more and gave me good exercise. In most cases, I didn't need to stop and rest while off the bus in London. It also fit into buses and taxis much better than my wheelchair would have permitted. Also, it provided an adequate seat in many restaurants and pubs.
Upon coming to the Tower of London, we were past lunch time and asked the driver for suggestions for a place to eat. He identified a little pub across from the Tower of London so we got off and walked over to it. This was a great little spot to eat and we had a delightful lunch there and Grace got to sample some of the local brews.
After lunch, we caught the bus again and continued to follow along the Themes. We later transferred to the Blue line again. We thought of getting off to see Herrod's goods, but were too tired to do so. We continued on to the stop by the Paddington Station were we had started the day. We got back to the trains and caught the train back to Heathrow. Once there we caught the 'Hotel Hoppa' again to return to the Marriott.
After resting a bit, we went down to the pub for a great dinner and a time of relaxing. The only thing that spoiled the day was that I wanted to swim after dinner since I had been sitting on the bus all day and anticipating the long train ride the next day...
The problem was, again, KIDS... Some kid has become sick while in the pool and had either thrown up or had some other type of accident in the pool; it was closed until further notice. The kids had struck again...
Oh, Well... Our next day was spent going to Edinburgh and that has been posted previously.
Next Installment: Flying to my homeland (Heimat)...
Sunday morning began well enough... We did go to the restaurant for our complimentary buffet breakfast early and thus avoided most of the kids. This may have been aided by the fact that if the kids behaved too badly, the parents may not have taken them to LegoLand! Also, the kids would have been rested and, therefore, exhibited reasonable behavior...
The typical English breakfast must have survived from the more barbaric days in Briton... Much of the food was highly salted and full of fat! And who in their right minds eats baked beans or blood pudding for breakfast? Fortunately, I could each the scrambled eggs (which seemed to have been made from powdered eggs), fresh fruit, yogurt and wheat toast. Overall, it was an adequate starter meal within my dietary plan.
After breakfast, we traveled to Heathrow to catch the 'tube' to London's Paddington Station. Unlike the day before, we did not go by taxi; we road the 'Hotel Hoppa' shuttle bus that can by the hotel every half hour. This cost only £3 each, considerably less than the previous cab ride. It did take a little longer, but the driver was extremely courteous and helped get my walker aboard. We got to Heathrow and then the adventure began...
On the weekend that we were there, the Paddington line was closed for repairs and we got to take the faster 'Heathrow Express' train to the station for the same price of £6 each (round trip). The challenge, however, was to get to both the tube station and then to the Heathrow Express station. We walked down long corridors to each and the total trip took about one half hour.
Once on the train, the fifteen minute trip was quite pleasant and we were at the Paddington Station rather quickly. When we explored the station, we found no elevators or escalators by which we could reach street level. Our only options were to use the stairs or go up a long sloping street (about a quarter of a mile in length), which we did. Upon reaching the street level, we needed to then find the tour bus stop. After about five minutes of checking, we saw one of the buses (that has 'get on/get off' service around the city) pull away from the stop. We then made our way to that place, bought our tickets, and waited for the next bus...
The 'tour' bus runs on three lines: the Blue, the Red and the Green lines. We were at the stop on the Blue line... Immediately, this area looked familiar; we had stayed at a small bed and breakfast hotel a couple of blocks away (NOTE: a dreadful experience that we did not want to repeat), so we had a 'handle' on what we needed to do... We would take this Blue bus to the Marble Arches and transfer to a Red bus that would take us about the city center.
[By the way, the Blue route goes around the west side of the city, including Buckingham Palace and Herrods while the Red bus goes around the middle of the city, including the Themes, Tower Bridge, Tower of London, and other points of interest. The Green bus goes into the northern portion of the city, including the British Museum.]
Thank goodness I had taken the walker instead of the wheelchair since it was much better adapted to getting on and off the bus. It allowed me to walk more and gave me good exercise. In most cases, I didn't need to stop and rest while off the bus in London. It also fit into buses and taxis much better than my wheelchair would have permitted. Also, it provided an adequate seat in many restaurants and pubs.
Upon coming to the Tower of London, we were past lunch time and asked the driver for suggestions for a place to eat. He identified a little pub across from the Tower of London so we got off and walked over to it. This was a great little spot to eat and we had a delightful lunch there and Grace got to sample some of the local brews.
After lunch, we caught the bus again and continued to follow along the Themes. We later transferred to the Blue line again. We thought of getting off to see Herrod's goods, but were too tired to do so. We continued on to the stop by the Paddington Station were we had started the day. We got back to the trains and caught the train back to Heathrow. Once there we caught the 'Hotel Hoppa' again to return to the Marriott.After resting a bit, we went down to the pub for a great dinner and a time of relaxing. The only thing that spoiled the day was that I wanted to swim after dinner since I had been sitting on the bus all day and anticipating the long train ride the next day...
The problem was, again, KIDS... Some kid has become sick while in the pool and had either thrown up or had some other type of accident in the pool; it was closed until further notice. The kids had struck again...
Oh, Well... Our next day was spent going to Edinburgh and that has been posted previously.
Next Installment: Flying to my homeland (Heimat)...
posted by Gerald Boerner's Blog at 8:47 PM
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