The Big Hop Septemer 6, 2006
Today is the big day. We move from Copenhagen to London. We had decided a couple of weeks back to tour the UK after finishing up Scandinavia in Copenhagen to try and make the most of the weather. The plan is to go back to France, Germany and Italy after the UK tour.
We will spend about a month between England, Scotland and Ireland. Most of this time will be spent driving the countryside in a rental car without a lot of preplanning, but we do have a week planned in London and another week in a cottage in the Scottish Highlands. More about that later.
It was raining when we got up this morning which will be a problem as we need to get the train station in order to get to the airport. Holly did a quick tour of the National Museum, which is one block from the Danmark, and came back raving about it. Maybe next time we’ll spend a day there. We stayed at the hotel until noon and although the rain didn’t stop it did ease to a light mist in time for our departure. This meant we put rain covers over all four packs and donned rain jackets for ourselves. Twenty minutes later we were at the rain station. First thing was a stop at the Poste (post office) to mail a couple of packages. In our unofficial “European Postal Rating System” (1-10) we give the Copenhagen Poste an 8. After the Poste we combined our immense brain power were able, after several minutes, to comprehend the straight forward directions to buy a train ticket from a machine and were soon on our way to the airport.
The Copenhagen Airport is large, clean and modern with all sorts of shops and conveniences. Again by applying both our computer like minds we determined how to use the self check in machines then checked our large packs for a sense of freedom only a weary traveler can know. Lunch was next followed by a short wait for our 3:45 PM flight.
We arrived in London on time; cleared customs had a short wait at the luggage carousel and then moved on to find our way to central London. We chose the Express that while more expensive at ￡14.50 (US28.50) only took 15 minutes as compared to an hour for the underground. While waiting on the platform a lady that appeared to be in her late fifties suddenly had a seizure. Holly and I did all that we could to comfort the lady while a man went to get train officials. The lady got worse and was incoherent with full dilated pupils when the train officers arrived. They immediately called for paramedics. We laid the lady on the floor as her spasms had become more violent and she was slipping from her chair. More train officers arrived and took over her care. Our train pulled up to the platform and we were torn as to what to do but finally decided we should go as there was nothing more that we were trained to do and could be of no further help. We wish her well.
We reached Paddington Station and had to transfer to the Circle / Wimbledon Line to reach our stop at Bayswater. A five minute walk from the station is the London House Hotel which is really hostel style accommodation with some private rooms. We have a family room, one double and two twin beds, with more space than we have had in a while. Oddly enough the sparsely furnished room, no chairs or table, has a 21” flat screen TV. The big bonus is a laundry room with washer and dryer!
The London House is situated in what appears to be a quite, nice inner city neighborhood with a grocery and a mall only a block away. This looks like it will be a nice place from which to base our London tour.
We will spend about a month between England, Scotland and Ireland. Most of this time will be spent driving the countryside in a rental car without a lot of preplanning, but we do have a week planned in London and another week in a cottage in the Scottish Highlands. More about that later.
It was raining when we got up this morning which will be a problem as we need to get the train station in order to get to the airport. Holly did a quick tour of the National Museum, which is one block from the Danmark, and came back raving about it. Maybe next time we’ll spend a day there. We stayed at the hotel until noon and although the rain didn’t stop it did ease to a light mist in time for our departure. This meant we put rain covers over all four packs and donned rain jackets for ourselves. Twenty minutes later we were at the rain station. First thing was a stop at the Poste (post office) to mail a couple of packages. In our unofficial “European Postal Rating System” (1-10) we give the Copenhagen Poste an 8. After the Poste we combined our immense brain power were able, after several minutes, to comprehend the straight forward directions to buy a train ticket from a machine and were soon on our way to the airport.
The Copenhagen Airport is large, clean and modern with all sorts of shops and conveniences. Again by applying both our computer like minds we determined how to use the self check in machines then checked our large packs for a sense of freedom only a weary traveler can know. Lunch was next followed by a short wait for our 3:45 PM flight.
We arrived in London on time; cleared customs had a short wait at the luggage carousel and then moved on to find our way to central London. We chose the Express that while more expensive at ￡14.50 (US28.50) only took 15 minutes as compared to an hour for the underground. While waiting on the platform a lady that appeared to be in her late fifties suddenly had a seizure. Holly and I did all that we could to comfort the lady while a man went to get train officials. The lady got worse and was incoherent with full dilated pupils when the train officers arrived. They immediately called for paramedics. We laid the lady on the floor as her spasms had become more violent and she was slipping from her chair. More train officers arrived and took over her care. Our train pulled up to the platform and we were torn as to what to do but finally decided we should go as there was nothing more that we were trained to do and could be of no further help. We wish her well.
We reached Paddington Station and had to transfer to the Circle / Wimbledon Line to reach our stop at Bayswater. A five minute walk from the station is the London House Hotel which is really hostel style accommodation with some private rooms. We have a family room, one double and two twin beds, with more space than we have had in a while. Oddly enough the sparsely furnished room, no chairs or table, has a 21” flat screen TV. The big bonus is a laundry room with washer and dryer!
The London House is situated in what appears to be a quite, nice inner city neighborhood with a grocery and a mall only a block away. This looks like it will be a nice place from which to base our London tour.
posted by Gary and Holly Davis @ 2:19 AM
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