May 24 - London

Oxford Circus crowds

Westminster Abbey

Buckingham palace

Take time to smell the flowers

M in front of Buckingham Palace

Toilets at Japanese Noodle shop

Where we are staying black door

where we come out to the street

Me on millenium footbridge across the Thames

 It was a busy day tho we didn’t get started til 11, I went out for a walk for a hour down through the alleyways and passages to the river, then across the Southwark Bridge and south of the river for a while, then back across the millenium bridge, tried for over half an hour to get a rental bike going with Santander i paid 3 times lol dam thing would not send me a confirmation code don’t know what the problem is and i could not get through to them calling from my phone either so it may be my Mint Mobile International plan anyway so i said chuck it walked back got M we went out for quite a few excursions, first…

to Oxford Circus now we are looking for a warm jacket for M since it is turning colder and rainy here and will be even colder up in Scotland everyone tells us… so H&M first stop, nope, then we did make it all the way up to Selfridges nope it was too high priced designer stuff and didn’t have anything practical at all, designer jean jacket lol closest thing, new part of it, with old jean jacket another part of it, some japanese name on it what? didn’t even look at the prices there it was crazy looking so we bailed out, down the street to another H&M nope, there were 3 H&M’s within a few blocks of each other and everything else, saw 3 Apple Stores so far, anyway, crowds were so thick the sidewalks buses trains all choc a bloc like crammed in everywhere a jumble of people. 

Finally we made it to Mark & Spencers and they had about 6 choices the first one was just the right size luckily there were only 2 of them in that size… so we got it for a fair price and we had seen a Japanese Udon noodle place on our walk around so we went back there had a really good lunch and rested up a bit, cuz then it was time to go to Westminster Abbey for the 5:00 Evensong church service. Well the notice we had on the web said west gate entry well no it was the north gate a long way to walk around there but we did get in just as they were starting the service which went for a hour choir singing along with the preacher in between… it was a nice place kind of like some of the places we saw in Florence St Croce lots of statues of people around the walls and plaques on the floor such as so buried here lots of earls and lords and navy heros from way back. Got out of there walked about a 1/2 mile to Buckingham palace it was crowded there in front too, and a long walk through St James park beautiful old old trees ponds with ducks and swans pretty place. Got a bus to a train station well we had to transfer from the victoria line to the central another one of those long long hamster tunnel connections with lots of steps up and down finally got to the central line and back to the studio apartment. 

Just had a light dinner grafted sourdough bread, cheese, tomatoes and olives with feta… well it was a big lunch at that noodle place and it’s working out well to have the big meal earlier and breakfast here in the apartment just muesli w fruit, tea toast and coffee for M, tea for me. 

Figured out our schedule til Tuesday as we are not getting up til 11 or so, we have to adjust cuz our train tuesday is at 11 from Kings Cross St Pancras station so we will need to be up by 8-830 to make that so starting tomorrow we wake up 9, then 830 Monday, 800 Tuesday, tho Tuesday will be an easy day just 3.5 hours ride first class car up to Edinburgh and we get there in time to take a taxi to the apartment and check in anyway… no plans for tomorrow well yes, we get back here and M tries on the jacket well the clerk left on a security tag which did buzz when we came out the door but the guard waved us on… but its on the zipper so we have to go back there to Mark & Spencer to have it removed and M says oh goodie they will probly have some other nice things there i can use… 

The river buses arent running now they don’t start til later into the tourist season but wow it was so crowded all up there oxford circus, westminster abbey, picadilly circus, trafalgar square all were wall to wall don’t see how it could get much more crowded but glad we won’t be here when it is, it was very tiring all day every bus and train and sidewalk so jam packed it wears one out… surprising tho every time someone would bump into you or get in your way or something like that they always would apologize Oh sorry, one thing about here the brits are very polite in all the stores and shops and restaurants the workers are very polite and well mannered act like they are genuinely happy to help you. 

I’m still working on pics just still some trouble getting them sized right and exported to a format google drive will accept… hang in there a couple more days i’ll get it… oh i went out tonight to get a beer we were going to stop for a pint i really enjoyed that dark ale last night at the blues club so i walked around some in the city I got a few blocks past St Pauls Cathedral it being saturday the city is shut down it was all big office buildings deserted execpt for a few “rough sleeper types” and an occasional stray tourist like me.. ok well it’s nearly midnight the cathedral bells will ring soon and the alarm is set for 9 so… goodnight for now, well i got some photos to upload… tomorrow should be better…