London, March 2012

A day and a half in London...

Visiting the country for a cousins birthday (which, by the way, was very very enjoyable indeed!) we decided to kill two birds with one stone as it were, and squeeze in a visit to England's capital.

In the past, my impressions of London have always been somewhat hurried, chaotic, smelly and noisy. A great big city with far too many people bustling about, coupled with far too much traffic making things unpleasant for all.

Well... my opinion has changed..... read on dear reader :-)

We (wife and I) arrived at King's Cross railway station at about two o'clock on a Sunday afternoon in March. A very pleasant, warm, sunny early Spring afternoon. We managed to get a room in a quite reasonably priced hotel directly opposite the station... nothing particularly fancy, but The Carlton Hotel offered us a clean, compact room which was ideal for what we needed.

After checking in and making a note of the all important breakfast times, we set off to explore the big city.

 Studying the area on google maps earlier, I noticed a canal basin not far from King's Cross, so that was where we headed on Sunday afternoon.

 The canals may not not look typically London but, because we were only spending a day and a half in in the city we decided not to try and see everything, but to take things nice and steady and concentrate on just a couple of interesting bits.

 For me quite difficult to believe that we were only 10 minutes walk away from the very busy King's Cross and International St. Pancras railway station, a building resembling more the Houses of Parliament than a railway station.

After returning from our tow path stroll we felt a bit peckish and decided a typical English 'cream tea' would keep us going until dinner at night.

Because it was nice and handy and looked posh, exactly the sort of place that served afternoon teas, we headed for the St. Pancras Hotel. It was indeed very nice but unfortunately cream teas were only served to those who had booked in advance.

I have to ask myself how can anyone know hours or perhaps days in advance that they fancy a cream tea? …........“ oh, I think I fancy a cup of tea and a scone next Wednesday at 3pm, let's book “

We, therefore had to make do with a pot of tea and some cakes... all very nicely presented, the tea was tasty and the cakes were, well... like cakes really. Somewhat overpriced at £25 for two me thinks!

 Bright and early on Monday morning, having tucked in to a hearty traditional English breakfast of Bacon, eggs, beans and sausages not to mention toast , orange marmalade and plenty of coffee, we went off to explore.

Although we weren't planning on doing any shopping, our first port of call was Oxford Street. Just to stroll along the street was quite a pleasant experience, and I was surprised that the street wasn't blocked with traffic at all.

To get around London we bought ourselves a day ticket for four zones, enabling us to move about under London's streets during the day and to travel to the airport in the evening without having to think about tickets.

I found myself minding more gaps in the space of 24hours than I had previously minded in my whole life! I was even looking for gaps that weren't there, and even now I glance occasionally over my shoulder in case a gap has mysteriously appeared behind me.