A small note to anyone who's checked my blog in the past... oh, I don't know... year or so and wondered where I've gone.
Let's just say it hasn't been the best year for blogging. I'm not sure if that trend will continue. I have occasion to wonder if I'll continue this blog or find another way to write about my experiences. I guess we'll see how it goes.
But in the meantime, here's England!
Wizard of Oz ended about 3 weeks ago and I spent a productive 10 days in Tucson before heading out on vacation to England. My friend Martin is down on the Isle of Wight attending sailing school and had a 5 day break before going to Australia to finish up his certifications. I went down to join him and some of his classmates before they left the country.
Normally, travel seems so simple at the outset. You just get on some kind of conveyance, sleep or read or think or whatever and then get off in a new place. Easy peasy.
However, in this case, Martin sent me a page of directions - full page, single space - to get me from Heathrow to Cowes, so I knew it wouldn't be simple. But goodness...
It probably really started a week before that with the packing. Tucson is the inside of an oven right now and the Isle of Wight was showing temperatures between 50-80F. Lovely, right? Except 50 requires a jacket and at 80 you can wear shorts.... And I was trying to pack as light as possible not having any idea what we would be doing for a week. So I finally crammed an amazing amount into a very small suitcase and got on a plane thinking "well, I have a credit card and England is a first world country so I can just buy anything else I need..."
It just occured to me that England is the only first world country I've visited in the past year. Strange...
I had a very pleasant 3 hour flight to Chicago followed by a 3 hour layover in O'Hare and then an 8 hour flight to London. I slept for a good portion of the flight so arrived feeling up to the challenge of going south.
Lots of signs to the train station in the airport and a 20GBP ticket to Paddington. Got to the platform, got on the train, overheard someone asking if this was the train to Paddington and the answer was "no" so I got off the train. Good to be surrounded by tourists at this point...
15 minutes, the right train and one public survey about the cleanliness of the train (4. good) later I arrived in Paddington station. After lots of tunnels and stairs and escalators I was immensely grateful for the smallness of my suitcase and arrived at the London Underground station and took the right train to the Waterloo station.
HUGE station. Finally sorted out which train and which platform and which time and bought a 30GBP ticket to Southampton and then really had to use the bathroom.
30p for entry.
The last time I paid for a bathroom was in China and I had to bring my own paper and squat over a hole in the ground and hope nothing I owned touched anything around me... In Waterloo it's crowded and complicated with a lot of people needing change and the machines eating money but 10 minutes later I'm on the train platform checking and double checking signs and then backtracking to ask the conductors if it is indeed the right train. Yes!
The train leaves the station and now I'm half way there...
From the Southampton train station I had to find the bus station and the free bus to the Town Quay with the ferry.
At the ferry I bought a "one way ticket" and didn't ask any further questions (tsk tsk tsk...) and feeling all full of success for having made it this far, boarded the ferry with all the families and their screaming kids and some kind of reunion of Golden Girls contemporaries and the ferry takes off.
Martin had specifed that the ferry took about 25 minutes and I knew something was wrong when the captain stated over loudspeaker that it would be an hour or so before we docked... But there's only one Isle of Wight so I knew I could just figure it out when I got there.
We're almost to the island when the captain again comes on to tell us that we're in the equivalent of a ferry holding pattern because there was an armed robbery in the ferry car park and the thieves tried to escape on the other ferry. So that ferry is docked holding the thieves hostage and awaiting "armed police responders", we're in the ocean waiting for that ferry to leave so we can dock and I'm wondering how the thieves were armed exactly since guns are outlawed in this country...
Turns out they did have guns and they did rob a jewelry store of their Rolex stash and then hoped to evade the cops by leaving the island on the ferry. Not a well thought thru plan...
We finally dock - no cops or perps in the car park - and even though I had walking directions I wanted to take a taxi. I mean, what's one more form of transport by this point... Found a taxi, described where I needed to go and the taxi driver says "no." No!!! he said it was close and I'd be better off walking.
????!!!???
So he proceeds to give me directions that are completely contrary to Martin's. I say "fine" and walk off - I might have stomped off in a fit of pique... - and decide to follow Martin's directions instead. As I turn the corner the same taxi driver drives by me yelling and gesturing "go the other way!"
Thanks England.
So I wander around and find the other ferry, the chain ferry that runs between East Cowes and Cowes and I know that his house is somewhere very close to here. But there are no familiar landmarks. So i flag down a woman on the street for directions and she turns out to be the wife of the ferry operator and tells me that I'm in East Cowes and I need to be in Cowes proper. She tells me to get on the chain ferry and ask her husband questions if needed ("tall scruffy looking fellow...")
Sigh.
So I get on the chain ferry, the ride is short and free (my two favorite things by that point) and as soon as we are halfway across the water I see the cottage on the other side. Walk up the ramp, use the doorcode, walk into the courtyard and hear "hi there!" look up and there he is, sitting in the window.
Only 2 planes, 2 trains, 2 ferries, a bus, a tube and an aborted taxi ride and I made it.
And it turns out that we spent the rest of the weekend sailing, so i didn't get free of transportation devices for quite some time.
Pictures to follow...
A number of the odd things sold at the Portobello Rd Market. Need deer antlers, china or fur coats? Well... you know where to go.
This picture below was my favorite London moment. Around town are public pianos with signs on them saying "Play me, I'm yours." And people sit down for a minute or an hour and play whatever they want. These kids and I had just been to see Midsummer Night's Dream at the Shakespeare theatre and one sat down and started into that great piano solo at the beginning of Journey's "Don't Stop Believing." The others ran up, got on the piano and started belting out the song until they got about 3 lines in and couldn't remember the lyrics. Funny and great street moment.
The Shakespeare Globe Theatre.
Musicians at the Portobello Market.
Crowds at the Portobello Market.
Scrabble tile sign.
This one's for Claudia... I didn't see any Duchesses though.
The experimental art "Fourth Plinth Project" in Trafalgar Square. An artist requested that over 2,000 people spend an hour apiece up on this platform doing whatever they want to do. They can pose or address the crowd, do something mundane or extreme. This guy had a book called "Lord Lucan Plinth" and his sign said "Here's Lucan at you kid." Point? hard to know...
2 punk kids at the Victoria and Albert museum
Cute catholic school kids also at the V&A
