Chapter 3 - London England

So the plane lands and we get off to go through customs, the United 1st class attendent had already gotten all of our stuff off and it was ready to go through the "VIP" customs line.  The five of us and maybe a half dozen others went through customs in about 1 minute.  The remainder of the passengers were in this HUGE gaggle waiting for their bags and we were done. It pays to fly United and save those frequent flier miles.

In case you never get to fly international 1st class, it doesn't end with the flight. Once through customs we were all treated to a little (fairly large for an airport) private "refresh room". Showers, heated towels, toiletries and a chance to look human again after the long and arduous flight from the US...

We had decided that we'd take the "tube", aka subway, from the airport to the stop closest to our "bed and breakfast" destination.  I found an ATM, stuck my debit card in and son-of-a-gun the right color money came out.  We had decided early (based on my previous trips) to put our money into our checking account and just use the ATM, much cheaper than money exchanges. I think between the five of us we may have had $50.00 in cash. The ATM might be one of the greatest inventions of the 20th century...

We finally leave the airport on the tube destined for downtown London. It's quite a long ride but the tube stop is clearly marked and we had an excellent map London Tube Map, our stop was Glouchester Road.  We arrive at the bed and breakfast at 10:00AM London time, DEAD TIRED because it's 3:00AM Moutain Time. Didn't matter that it was a sunny, warm day the body's clock said sleep, SCREAMED SLEEP... dang we can't check in until at least 1:00PM.  We did however leave our luggage while Susan and I walked around like zombies, the kids were off to fix Eddies tongue piercing...

We finally pass out on the bed for a short nap before we head to the theater for Cats.

I don't know why Rebecca HAD to see Cats, I didn't want to and the boys were pretty ambivalent.   James seemed OK with it but still not overly excited.

So we get to the theaer, I expect reasonably good seats, but these are like front row (maybe second) center. The stage/set is built right into the seats, the whole thing moves for scene changes. 

The "Cats" or the actresses (and I suppose actors but I didn't notice) were all dressed in SKIN tight leotards that looked like kitty cats, wiskers, ears the whole thing.  BUT the most noticable part was the skin tight. and DARN if those kitty cats couldn't resist rubbing up against the two boys mostly. They kinda stayed away from me as I'm OLD and my wife was sitting right next to me.  By rub up against I mean use your wildest imagination nd you might get the idea.... It looked like they both had catnip sprinkled all over them.... haha, it was great.

But really the play was fabulous. I never imagined a play could be this much fun... I saw "Cats" again a couple years later in Charlotte and I was very disappointed....

Dragging back to bed (didn't care about breakfast) it was like sleep heaven... But up the next morning to tour London. Very nice, I'd recommend the "New" Old Globe Theater. It wasn't open for performances when we went but we looked around and the museum was open, we saw a Shakespearian play there the following year, highly recommended... At least as good as Cats, probably even better.... Maybe we'll talk about that if I ever get to our "romantic" (without kids) trip.

The "tube" is just plain fun to ride around, goes everywhere... "Mind The Gap" as the conductor says.

Also the art museums are top notch.  I'm not going to bore everyone with the details, I'm not going to put all the tourist landmark pictures up... But they look just like the movies...

So Monday morning we're headed for Ireland, via Wales in a rental car... I told them I wanted the largest sedan they had.  It was, well shall we say, NOT big enough for five adults and all our luggage. Stuff was packed everywhere, the trunk barely closed... But never fear we have to turn this rental in as rentals don't go from England/Wales to the Republic of Ireland, or Northern Ireland for that matter. Something about the IRA (at that time). hmmm...

The drive through Wales was the most nondescript, boring drive I can remeber, It's almost like driving through southern New Mexico, desolate. We stopped at one place, I think to get something to eat. We went in and all the folks were chatting rather loudly in "Welsh" I guess. It was instantly quiet, the entire time we were there they all spoke in wispers, like we could understand them....

After what seemed like forever we arrived at Holyhead, Wales where we were to catch the "High Speed" ferry to Dublin.... Sounded interesting to me... ended up being pretty amazing.  We checked our luggage then went to the ferry dock... Oh My Goodness, this thing is maybe 110' at the beam (across) and at least 300 feet long, maybe longer.  It held 30 or so full size tour busses and over a hundred cars on the lower deck.  It's said that you can ride across in your car but it didn't look like fun to me.

The "ferry is a flat front semi-hydro catmeran (it has two narrow hulls on the outside and rides mostly out of the water on hydrofoils). It must reach close to fifty mph as the wind outside is intense.  There's a little deck on the very back where passengers can stand and see the water purpulsion jets, I kid you not this "ferry" is a technological marvel. It's powered by turbine engines (same as a jet plane)which in turn pump HUGE columns of water out of the back... check out the movie clip (not mine). Off the back deck of the "ferry"
The entire front window goes from side to side you can be seated for a meal, sit at a bar, or just stand at the window. The "ferry" has a complete casino and one-arm bandits all over, shops, snacks and just about anything one could want.  It was so impressive Susan and I did it again the following year too.

If I remember correctly the trip takes about an hour and forty-five miuutes, seemed like 10 minutes... So we arrive in Dublin, the Republic of Ireland... hmmmm what a treat....

AND what a suprise, the rental car was even SMALLER than the one we left in Wales.... joy....

I do have a single photo, I'm skipping all the photots of things you've already seen in the movies (or on TV). This photo happens to be the place we stayed at in London. It couldn't properly be called a bed & breakfast as it was mainly used by students visiting and touring Europe, it had a bed but no breakfast.. It was certainly exactly right for us, not too fancy but served the purpose well....

Bed no Breakfast - London England

It really was more than adequate, we stayed the same place the following year, right in the neighborhood.....

Cheers