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Since we last checked in, we have stayed in: London
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London We arrived at our flat in London at 11:00PM, about 5 hours later than expected due to flight delays, and because we had to ride out of Heathrow to a different underground station rather than using the one in the airport. It was great to have a place to stay for 10 days after moving so often, and to be able to prepare some "home cooked" meals, and to see our friends Pam and Hillary who shared the flat with us. It is in the South Kensington district, which is a very ”posh” part of London, just south of Hyde Park. Our first night at 2:00AM, we were awakened by a neighbor blasting Spanish Flamingo and Opera, and howling and scratching at the window. Luckily, the police hauled him off the next day and the place was quiet for the rest of our stay.
We saw a couple of plays including Richard Dreyfuss and Marsha Mason in ”Prisoner of Second Avenue”. The next day, thanks to our friends, we all had lunch with Richard. He told us the story of meeting the Queen, and all the protocol that he had to go through to address Her Highness properly. It has to do with the proper nasal inflection when saying ”Ma’am”. Luckily, we had great weather in London and it only rained a couple of times. After 10 days, we decided to abandon the bikes, and tour the country by car with Pam and Hillary. Bath We left Victoria Station in our Vauxhall Vector (fast and cornered well with 4 adults and luggage) and headed east to Bath where Jim was caught speeding by radar within the first 10 minutes. Bath was a nice escape from the hectic pace of London. We took a day trip down to the coast at Lyme Regis where ”The French Lieutenant’s Woman” was filmed, and went to Stonehenge and Avbury where there are similar unexplained stone ruins (aliens or clever ancient civilization?).
On our final night in Bath, we went to a pub to watch a football match. Manchester (a huge underdog) beat Munich by scoring a goal with 1 minute left to tie the game, and then scored a goal several minutes into overtime to win the game. It was the first time in 28 years that Manchester had won the European championship. We felt very lucky to see such an exciting game until the next day when we had to drive by Manchester on our way to the Lake District. 500,000 fans converging on the city combined with a ”wagon” that rolled over on the motorway caused us to drive an extra 4 hours on backroads to get around it. |
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Lake District The lake district is a beautiful area of steep but small hills and numerous lakes (”waters” to the English). It is incredibly green due to all of the rain that they get, and we spent our afternoon watching it pour from the shelter of a restaurant. We sampled the famous Bakewell pudding which is a pastry crust, a thin layer of jam, and marsipan topped with warm custard. Later in the trip we went to the town of Bakewell, where we had a completely inferior version at the shop where it was claimed to have been invented. Edinburgh, Scotland Endinburgh is a very striking city, and we were lucky to have a bright sunny day to enjoy it. We hiked up the volcano to Arthur’s Seat on the edge of the city where we enjoyed increadible views of the city and surrounding countryside. Atfer our hike, we went to the Scottish Whiskey Heritage Center and took an interesting but somewhat corny tour explaining the history and production of Scotch. We all could have stayed a few extra days and further explored the city. Cambridge It is a beautiful college town comprised of 38 small colleges among wide open parks (”pieces” or ”greens”). However, we spent our time there in the "skollerly persutes" of doing laundry and dumpster diving for cardboard boxes to pack our bikes and panniers for our flight to Copenhagen. |
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Things We Really Liked About England. Quality and diversity of food is much better than our last visit Things We Didn't Like About England Expensive (gas $5.25/gallon ouch, restaurants very expensive) Numbers for the Trip Bike kilometers to date – 1,263 Copenhagen So far we are really enjoying Copenhagen. Details to follow. Till our next update ... |
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