Up and about before the alarm and a very light breakfast of juice, yoghurt and coffee. The coach arrived 8:30 and only then did we find out it was a public holiday, as the traffic was very light for the short journey to the railway station and the Eurostar to London.
We hung around for a while at the station, watching the rather dubious characters hanging around outside. We knew that this was one of the worst places of the whole trip for pickpockets and muggers and so were all extra careful.
Our train wasn’t until 11:15, though we were there early enough for the 10:15, which was very frustrating, as we had planned on a 10:30 train, as per our itinerary and it appears that the travel agent had assumed that he would allow time for stragglers. Once again. Not very impressed, as it would mean that by the time we hit Nottingham, it would probably be rush hour.
We wasted the hour by just sitting around, drinking coffee and generally just twiddling our thumbs and dumping Euro coins. Immigration for both France and UK was completed at the station without any problems and as a large group, we were allowed onto the platform before everyone else (which miffed one or two others in the queue...) and loaded all our luggage into a specific locked compartment, before heading for our allocated seats in coach 14.
The run to St Pancras was easy enough and the tunnel didn’t freak out Paula at all – much to her surprise.
We unloaded the luggage and said our farewells to a great group, before heading for the underground. Queuing for a ticket was a pain and took about half an hour and the wind was whistling through! £10.60 lighter, we soon hit the train and Paula waited patiently for the daylight as she is not a fan of the London underground. Once above ground, she visibly relaxed.
First impressions of London Underground stations though – NO GRAFFITI! This was such a pleasant change from France and Italy and it begs the question that if the London Underground can eliminate it, then anyone can.
We arrived at Hatton Cross (the last stop before Heathrow Airport) and lugged the cases up the stairs. A very kind gentleman carried Paula’s case up the stairs for her, saying that as he was too fat to run away with it, she was perfectly safe!
Right across the road is our usual car hire place – SixT, and we simply wheeled our cases across and picked up the Vauxhall Corsa hire car. On checking the paperwork, it was supposed to have a full tank of fuel, but it was only 7/8th full. So we pointed it out and the staff simply asked us to drive to the petrol station next door where they put in 8 litres – almost 2 gallons!
With the TomTom set to Jeremy Clarkson’s guidance, we headed off and within minutes, were distracted by him and a small fender bender accident, ending up heading South instead of North on the notorious M25! Unlike NZ motorways, it isn’t a case of a couple of hundred yards and turnaround. Here is it is usually several miles!
Once heading in the right direction, all was good though the traffic was a bit slow in places on the M1 and fine until we got to the Nottingham ring road. Totally ignoring Clarkson, we ducked and dived through the back streets missing out the traffic and finally arrived at Sue & Dave’s. I nipped out to see Stewart, Manu and young Noah who was quite funny. It didn’t take long for him to accept “Ga-Ga” again.
The weather is still cool, but no rain.
Well, from now on, you may get condensed rather than daily snippets, but as the only readers are now likely to be friends in NZ, not too much of major interest in terms of travel info, but who knows, maybe we will do some interesting local travel after all? Pics are as likely to be of family...
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