Day 1 It's been a while!

It's been a while since my last post.  I had planned to discontinue blogging but a few of my friend, and really one in specific, still look at it so I thought I should start it up again.  So hello everyone!  During the last couple months I have been doing a lot of traveling.  I decided about 3 months ago that I should travel more so I took a big dive into that idea booking a 3 1/2 week trip to Europe only 13 days before my plane took off.  And during my travels I wrote a travel blog.  I found that I took special care to remember my day to write later it was much easier to recall the day.

So for a good while this blog will be dedicated to my adventures around the world as I share those travel blogs to the entire internet (or those who use the internet and are a friend of mine)!  So here we begin with my traveling adventures starting with my flight over to London and my adventures around a part of the city.

And of course there will be lots of photos.  Over the 3 1/2 weeks in Europe I took over 4000 photos!  Thank goodness for digital!

Day 1 Getting to London

I left Kansas City for my first international flight ever at about 10am.  It seems a new tradition for my mom and I to head to First Watch and enjoy a potato and egg scramble.  So good and a great way to start a very very long day.

The first flight to Atlanta was just fine.  I got to the airport way too early thinking that I needed a lot of extra time for an international flight compared to a domestic flight. Not so much.  All I had to do was slide my passport through the scanner and done.  It put a little note on my boarding pass that said that my passport was valid.  Easy going.  The first flight was almost full.  Thankfully I had a window seat and a small lady next to me so it was no problem.

The second flight to Detroit was equally uneventful.  This time I had an isle seat on a 777.  I hadn't been on a plane that size for a long while.  9 seats across.  I suppose that is what happens when you go from one airline hub to another.  Short and sweet with individual screens on each seat to busy myself while crossing parts of the country.

I had a pretty long layover in Detroit so I took it upon myself to walk the entire concourse. After getting to one end I took the tram back to the center next to my gate.  I also stopped by the currency exchange store front.  What a rip off!  The rate lately has been one pound to 1.57 but she said the exchange was 1.77.  Ill admit I laughed a bit by what they were pulling over on people.

I sat down at the gate and a nicer older woman sat close by so I struck up a conversation with her.  She had lived on the US for 43 years but was originally from London.   She was heading back to visit some family.  Her name was Iris.  We had such a great conversation that she hoped that we would be on the same flight back.

I got on my first international flight with no problems at all.  I was moved from middle to the isle seat and then no one sat in my original seat.  So seating was great but the red eye not so much.  I even took a sleeping pill and I could still not fall asleep.  Just like Avenue Q it sucks to be me.

The flight was not too bad.  They had screens on each headrest so I watched a couple movies.  Two not so great movies and one that I already watched so I knew it was good.  And continued to try to sleep, no luck there.

Once we arrived around 11am I headed to customs.   You had to fill in the card on the plane so it would be ready by the time you walked through all the corridors which felt like miles after a long flight.  I finally made to the line which most people said it could be a nightmare but it only took 5 minutes to get through.  Once I got to the agent he asked how many days I was spending in the UK, which I figured was about 17 days.  He asked if I was a vacation which I responded how did you guess.  Was it was tshirt and track jacket.  He laughed and said most travelers staying for that long were on vacation   He stamped my passport, my first stamp on a passport ever, and off I went!

I took some pictures inside the airport because there was cool Olympic stuff.  Everywhere!  And ambassadors handing out various maps and guides.  I always grab that kind of stuff on vacation because you never know what you are going to find inside a guide.  Plus I always hoard all my paper on vacations for craft projects in the future.

I found the underground, bought my oyster card, which is the underground travel card, and headed into underground.  It was very easy to get into the underground as it is connected into the airport so you didn't even need to step outside to get onboard.  It only took about 40 minutes to get into the city and about a 10 minute walk from the station to the hotel.  I made friends along the ride that were also from the states who took the photo below for me.  PS the underground is totally a misnomer because it not all underground.  False advertising!

I stayed at the Umi Hotel in the Paddington area.  It is the home base for Top Deck, the tour company I took, and it is certainly not fancy.  I had read a lot online about the high prices in London and how small the rooms are even with the high prices.  I can say that I agree plus my hotel did not have air conditioning and at 90 degrees outside it was a bit tough to be indoors.

I took about an hours worth nap, which was not much considering I had been up since the previous day.  And I was off my own time zone by 6 hours!  But that was probably a good thing to help me get onto to new time zone.

Because it was my first time traveling internationally and alone I got nervous about heading out.  

 I argued with myself for a bit, got a little nauseous from my nervousness but convinced myself to leave my room and head into the city.

I started by taking a 5 minute walk to Hyde park which was due south from my hotel.

It was the hottest day of the summer, they hit a record high that day, so there many people out enjoying the park.  Bikes all around, groups enjoying a picnic, Frisbees flying and kids playing on the playgrounds.  I walked around the park for a out an hour.  It was the perfect start to my solo trip.

I stopped by Kensington palace which was the favorite palace of Diana.  The gardens around the palace are beautiful. I would return to with my London Pass later after the tour.

Out in front of the palace sits Queen Victoria.  She also called Kensington Palace home during her 60 year reign.  Quite stately, but it is England after all.

 I continued around the park until I found a gold statue of a king with huge statues around him.  Talk about being impressed with himself.

Across the road was Prince Albert hall.  A round performing arts hall with plenty of details to look at.  I had already learned that in London everything has history and details a plenty.  Some of buildings in the area were truly a sight to see.  I've never seen anything like them before.  

I wondered around a bit more and ended up in one of the museum areas.  On one of the buildings there was a dedication wall to remember the damage that was done during the blitz of WWII.  History was around you everywhere.  They really embrace their history and share it with everyone who visits.

I decided to head into the Victoria and Albert museum.  That place is huge and it is free.  

I only saw about a quarter of what it had to offer.  Beautiful sliver and gold pieces, the biggest tapestries of all time which were about 40 feet across, 

collections of jewelry from 2000 + years ago to current plus paintings that hung everywhere.  You could easily get lost in there easily.  In fact I asked on of the docents there and he said that recently one person who had worked there for five years got lost inside.

My final stop in London was to Harrods.  What a crazy place that is.  I thought it would be a lot like Halls in KC and boy was I wrong.  It was the most expensive, decorated, over the top places that I had ever seen and it was swarming with people.   

Each room was themed like a theme park would be.  The quality of everything there was top of the line.  They had everything, chandeliers, jewelry, housewares, clothing and every other thing you could think of is inside.

There was also a Harrods themed shop that just had stuff with Harrods on it for all the tourists.  And even that stuff was expensive.  Ten pounds for a reusable bag, aka 16 ish dollars, I don't think so.

Craziness!  One of the biggest draws for the average tourists were all the food halls and restaurants.  They had every type of cuisine you could think of, including a tea room!   I bought a sandwich at one of the food courts to say that I bought something at Harrods.  

I took the underground back to the hotel since I had wandered pretty far away.  One thing that I was not expecting in London were the street signs to find your way around.  They are all the walls of the buildings.  Not on street corners or traffic lights.  Sometimes they were a bit difficult to find or they just weren't there or around the corner on another wall.  A bit odd for me but added to a different experience.

I made it back to my hotel after a long day of travelings and a good afternoon around the city.  I ate my sandwich from Harrods and watched a bit of BBC in England.  Yes BBC, not BBC America, sweet.  After staying up as long as I could I tucked in for the day for my tour departing the next morning.