London

Internet Woes -

I’m not sure how many have noticed that I haven’t made any blog page entries for a while but there’s a good reason for this.
On 4 August we flew from L.A to London and are still in England. Wi-fi is pretty much non existent here and indeed people I have asked have said they didn’t know what that was, including hotel staff! Yes there are internet cafes but they are few and far between and certainly not easy to find on the beaten track. Some libraries have internet access but depending on what part of the country you are in the rules vary. Some require you to join the library first, some don’t, some charge, some don’t, some have old PC’s which run at a dinosaur pace, some don’t but perhaps the most frustrating rule is that most libraries require you to reserve a slot even if there are free screens. So all in all it is very difficult to get internet access and when we do it is for a short time and we can’t use our own laptop thus preventing me uploading photos to the webpage etc. We were spoiled in the USA with free access at 90% of places that we stayed. The times that we have stayed in a hotel in England, internet has on occasion been offered in-room but at a cost of 5GBP ($15 NZ) for 2 hours so we haven’t bothered. Anyway now that I have a chance to update the blog page any feedback would be appreciated as maybe nobody has missed it anyway?!


London

9,000,000 people and the largest city in Europe. As always a great place to visit and we were lucky with the weather for our 3 days here. We did the London Eye (45GBP = $135 NZD) for a half hour spin above the city, walked along the Thames embankment and across Tower Bridge. We popped into the Tate Modern and strolled passed the Tower of London but didn’t go in as it would have been another 45GBP. One of the best things to do in London I discovered after my visit here in 2004 was the London Walks. These are guided 2 hour walks and there are over 8-10 running at different times every day to all different parts of the city. Walks include tracing The Beatles footsteps, Knightsbridge, Jack the Ripper walks at night and pub walks. They are also superb value at 6GBP ($18 NZ) for an adult and free for children. We did a Kensington walk which included a visit to a 3 acre rooftop garden complete with a river and real flamingoes atop a 6 storey building. The walk also took us to Kensington Gardens and Kensington Palace where Princess Diana lived. The other walk we did was a Harry Potter one showing us the parts of London that inspired J.K Rowling and areas that appear in the books including Diagon Alley.