Brave or Crazy? On Our Way to Manchester

We decided it would be fun to drive all the way up to Manchester.  You know, that way we could stop along the way, see some sights, enjoy the beautiful English countryside.  We rented a car in London, near Hyde Park, and managed to get out of town.  Luckily for us, they were all out of the standard car we had reserved, so they just HAD to give us this one.  A convertible. Darn.  A Mercedes.  Drat. 

Lucky for us it was a beautiful sunny day!  The best day so far - 

we could drive with the top down.  

Notice the driver's side?  It's on the WRONG side!  

You would think that getting used to driving on the right-hand side of the car would be difficult enough.  You would think that driving on the WRONG side of the road would be challenging.  Add to that the fact that London (and Manchester for that matter) streets were designed to fit one horse, not four lanes, 5 gazillion taxis and buses and 14 quadrillion people crossing at all different times on the road.

We turned on our trusty Ms. Navi and she directed us so primly and properly out of the chaotic city.  Whew!  We made it!  I love Ms. Navi.  She is so sweet.  I want her in my car.  My Ms. Navi is not nearly so pleasant as this one.  This picture by the way was taken when we were safely out of town so we could stop and put the top down.

We did make one stop along the way to Cambridge.  What a beautiful college town.  Nothing like other college towns I've seen, like UCLA, USC, or BYU - or even Harvard - well, Harvard is a tiny bit similar.  

This was spectacular - and to think of the centuries of history laid within the cobblestones and library bookshelves is staggering.

You could rent a punt and have fun on the little picturesque river.  So cute! 

We stopped for lunch at a little cafe across from King's College.

Back on the road . . . en route to Manchester.  Lovely pastural scenes with plenty of cows and sheep dotting the landscape. 

I thought the sunset was just stunning - and not bad considering this was taken at 80 mph.

We almost arrived without incident.  I feared it was too good to be true.  If getting out of London, and navigating the cart-sized-streets-with-cars-parked-on-both-sides of Cambridge wasn't bad enough, trying to find the rental return in Manchester proved to be too much.

The place just didn't exist.  Ms. Navi couldn't even find it.  She thought she did a couple of times, but no luck.  It would probably have been easy if places around here had actual addresses.  Anyhow, it was dark, we needed to get to the hotel so John could meet up with his team, and we were quite frankly d-o-n-e.  We tried calling Hertz, but they never did answer, so we continued on to the hotel and figured we'd either have them come pick it up themselves in the morning, or I (gasp!) would return it.  

Saved by the bell, or boom, or pop, or whatever you want to call it!  

There was a noise, a hiss and then a bumpy ride.  We got a flat tire!  We were in who-knows-where-industrial part of town, not far from our hotel, so we drive on the flat . . . hoping that we'll make it, and that Ms. Navi won't misdirect us.  

We find the hotel, pull into the lot and the bellhop comes over to help with the car and our bags.  We tell him we have to park it because it has a flat, and he looked at it and said, 

um . . . both tires are flat!  

What?  

He took everything for us, told the concierge, and they handled everything!  They were able to get a hold of Hertz!  By the time we had dinner (which was fabulous by the way, and the chocolate mousse was sinfully divine, but I digress), our fun, sporty, stressful car was happily towed away for us.  Yeah!  I don't have to figure out how I am going to drive on the WRONG side of the car on the WRONG side of the street in a crazy busy part of a strange and unfamiliar town! 

Not only that, our super nice and friendly and overly helpful concierge delivered a nice card in a sealed envelope to our room explaining how everything was taken care of for us.  

If you are EVER in Manchester, this is seriously the best hotel.  It has to be one of the nicest I've been in, but the staff is by far the most helpful and friendly and accommodating ever!  Even the maitre de, the busboy and the waiter were over-the-top nice.  

Now I'm hoping that there is actually something for me to do in this city tomorrow.  John will be in meetings all day.  I think I get to paint the town red, or at least walk it.  Too bad the dollar is so weak compared to the pound, making everything cost nearly twice as much, because there is serious shopping that can be done!  

London on Tuesday

Our last full day in London! 

We filled it up with a double-decker site-seeing tour bus and also river boat tour.

Feed the Birds . . . tuppence a bag . . . (hear Mary Poppins?)

St. Paul's Cathedral (where Charles and Diana were married).  This is a spectacular building, designed by Christopher Wren.  It is an active cathedral, with 5 services a day, yet they charge 10 pounds a person (about $18) to see inside and there is no photography allowed at all.  They want you to buy the pictures from them.  Crazy!  Talk about money changers in the temples.  Geesh!

At the Tower of London.  This place is a whole city in and of itself.  One can spend a good couple of hours here.  This building is where the crown jewels are displayed.  The Tower is where Royalty were beheaded and was basically a fortress, torture chamber, and prison centuries ago.

In the City of London (which is only 1 sq.mi).  This is the first double-sided clock in history.

We met Matt and Kim briefly for lunch and a little shopping in Covent Gardens, then had to say good-bye!  They are on their way back to Tokyo now.  We'll miss you!!

Tower Bridge from the boat. 

Cleopatra's Obelisk.  The oldest thing standing in all of London.

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre.  Or at least the re-creation of it since the original burned down in the great fire of 1666.  

The end of our boat tour.  Our hotel is in the background.

We went back and took a 1 1/2 hour yoga class together, gym, and sauna!  That was awesome.

Great way to end a great day!

London - Days 3 & 4

We love being able to take advantage of the Theatres here in the city.  We saw "Lion King" since we missed it when it was in L.A.  Funny thing that we had to travel all the way to the U.K. to see something that was at home.  Can't wait to see "Wicked" at home!  Don't want to let that one get away.

Picadilly Circus

I don't think this particular shot shows it very clearly, but if you look closely, you can see that is actually General Conference on John's phone.  We got a kick out of how we can still watch Conference, while in an English Pub.  I think there's too much glare on it, but trust me, we did it!

The Tower Bridge at night.  Stunning!!  I hope to go on it during the day.

"London Bridge" is near it, but it's nothing special.  The REAL London Bridge is actually in Lake Havasu, Arizona!  That was taken down brick by brick and reassembled in AZ.  Crazy!  London Bridge really did fall down.

Monday morning we quickly ran down to Buckingham Palace to see the Changing of the Guards.  It takes place at 11:30 every other day.  We had to run, literally, because we (read:  John) slept in until nearly 11:00 a.m.  Why?  Because he pulled another all-nighter working.  He finally got to bed at 6:30 this morning, so he only got a few hours of shut-eye.  What's new?

. . . Only to do more work while waiting for the guards to pass.  But seriously how cool is it that he can actually accomplish work like this.

I need to find out what's the meaning of those furry-black-olive-looking hats.

I suppose marching behind horses has its hazards!

St. James Park at Buckingham Palace.  The Eye is in the far background.

This is very reminiscent of Central Park, in fact, the whole city is.  It's quite apparent that New York was patterned after London - it's what they knew after all.

Turned out to be a stunningly gorgeous and warm day!  Yeah!!

The Canal through Little Venice.  Such a beautiful neighborhood!

We found this quaint little pub at the end of Little Venice/Paddington in a neighborhood and stopped for lunch.  It was very English - we almost felt as though we were intruding on the locals.  It was so good - we were so glad we happened upon it.  I could just picture "Lady and the Tramp" eating spaghetti outside it.

Up and away for a flight on the London Eye!  

All lit up at night - that's our hotel behind it.

In the Eye capsule

London - Day Two - Saturday Oct 4

Today we took the Tube to Notting Hill and met Matt and Kim.

On the weekends, there is a giant outdoor market on Portobello Road.

We browsed for a few hours and the weather cooperated quite nicely, only sprinkling a couple of times. 

It's a very popular place.  Lots of crowds. 

In one of the shops, Matt dressed up in in this Middle Eastern get-up, reminiscent of his Afghanistan days.

Shwarma for lunch, then off to Harrods's for quite the shopping experience.  It's safe to say that there is none quite like it!  I was really tempted to buy the $12,000 shoes, or the $3,200 handbag, but decided against it at the last minute and instead got a toy for the kids.  No, not this giant teddy bear, it just wouldn't fit in the overhead bin on the plane! 

In the housewares department, they had a 'band of chefs' playing everything from a plastic baguette, to swiss cheese, to pots and pans.  They were hilarious!

John and Matt couldn't resist trying out the exotic drum set, complete with a set of wooden spoons.

It was almost creepy, but in the middle of Harrod's was giant shrine dedicated to Princess Diana and Doty (his is the family who owns Harrod's).

We finished off the evening with dinner at a cafe and a show.

Then, back to our hotel to Skype the kids!  I think they had more rain in California then we have had here this whole time!

London - Day One - Friday Oct 3

Woo Hoo!  We arrived in London.  That was a looooong flight.  I read a whole book, saw a movie, and slept a little bit.  I was actually quite envious of the people that seemed to be sleeping like a baby for hours.  How in the world can they possibly be comfortable?  Their seats must recline more than mine, or something like that (sleeping pills is probably more like it). 

We took a cab to our hotel.  Our taxi driver was the sweetest grandpa with such a strong cockney accent I sometimes had a difficult time understanding him.  Once he found out that this was my first time in London, he turned our ride into a tour.  So sweet.  I love the cabs here; they are so cute, roomy, and comfy.  

I think what has surprised us the most is the weather.  All the reports said it would be in the 60s, but there must be a heckuva wind chill because it is bitter freezing.  My cheeks were numb in no time at all.  

Because we arrived in the morning, we were at our hotel by 10:00 a.m. - too early to check in, so they stowed our stuff for us and had us go up to the Executive Lounge for breakfast, which was perfect because we were pretty hungry.  Then we hit the town - even though we were exhausted from the long flight, and really feeling the need to freshen up.

The hotel is right on the Thames, just across from Big Ben and Parliament, and the London Eye (ferris wheel) is just outside our window.

Standing on Westminster Bridge.  Cute taxi driving by!  Parliament is in the background.

On Westminster Bridge.  This was taken on our way back to the hotel, after walking for a couple of hours.  A Canadian on a bike snapped the shot for us. 

Had to get a picture of the classic red phone booth!  John was a zombie at this point.  If he sat down, he would have been asleep instantly.

This angle is from the front of our hotel.

This is taken from our room - that is part of the Eye.

We went back to the hotel about 1:30 and they had our room ready for us early - which was so perfect!  It gave us time to take a nap before Matt and Kim were scheduled to arrive!  We slept for a good three hours.  Much needed after practically going for three days straight.

Matt and Kim! All the way from Japan - How cool is that?

We went to dinner, then to the theatre and saw "Spamalot."

Aaahhh . . . back to the hotel where the bed was turned down, chocolates on the pillow, and comfy slippers awaiting my tired feet.