One thing Rob didn't mention is that the trip to the London Eye was a really cool surprise he planned just for me. He bought us tickets for 10:00 am on Christmas Eve and the streets were really empty and quiet. Even though it was 10:00, the sun was really low in the sky--this combined with the quiet streets made it seem like we had the London morning all to ourselves.
Our quick vist with Darren and Diana was really nice. It was great to get to check out their place and to walk around their neighborhood a little bit. We've definitely missed having them around San Francisco.
And it was great to spend a couple hours with Phil--who travelled all the way to London, with a hangover, just to have lunch with us. Now that's love! The one disappointment is that his girlfriend Helen was able to come with him. Hopefully we four can arrange to meet one of these days so I can begin turning her into a football fan.
Finally, Rob failed to mention that our whirlwind London trip ended in chaos. Having what we thought was plenty of time to get to Victoria Station to catch the bus to his brother's in Bournemouth, we decided to walk through Portobello Street on the way to the underground. Portobello Street is an extremely busy street market in London and probably very interesting though we didn't really get to check it out much. As soon as we got there we realized the underground wasn't as close as we thought it would be so we immediately started racing our way down the hill to the station, wheeling our luggage through the crowds. When we finally arrived at Ladbroke Station, we learned it's on a different line then Notting Hill Station (which we walked past on our way to Portobello Street.) This meant that we had to change trains to get to Victoria. We watched the minutes ticking away as we waited for our train, constantly recalculating how much time we had left before our bus left. When we fnally got on the correct train, I asked a fellow passenger how close the buses were to the station--thinking they would be right outside the gates. To our dismay, I learned it's a good 10 minute walk to the buses. Doing one final recalculation, we realized we would only make the bus if 1) we RAN to the bus stops and 2) the bus left late. Well, we did our part and ran all the way, but the bus let us down by leaving on time. We missed it by a couple minutes. It was another 90 minutes until the next bus which, in retrospect doesn't seem so bad, but at the time felt completely heartbreaking.
Waiting for the train at Ladbroke station
2 comments:
I think you meant to write that Phil's girlfriend, Helen, was NOT able to come to London. Have you got a photo of the item you pruchased that was the ral reason you were late for the bus?
I guess I rely too much on Spellchick (!)
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