Topdeck Time

Shereen and I arrived at the hotel departure point for our British Isle Topdeck tour with slight apprehension. The day would be awkward, no doubt. You are on a bus with 22 other people of different ages, from different countries and backgrounds and your all listening to the guy at the front of the bus promising you will all soon be best friends. We passed the first hurdle easily enough, getting up in front of all these strangers and talking about yourself for a minute (which felt like talking for 10) and as everyone went up and made a few jokes or had jokes made about them by their traveling buddy, we all started to loosen up a bit. We had a fair way to go as we were bound for York that evening, but we made stops in Oxford and Stratford-upon-Avon on the way. Shereen and I were thoroughly disappointed that the Christchurch grounds (where a lot of Harry Potter was filmed) weren't open to visitors at that time of day, but we went and got some breakfast (the tour had started very early that day) and tried not to wander too far so that we weren't the late ones back at the very first meet-up. We arrived perfectly on time, but everyone else had been early so we still felt the little pang of embarrassment at being last. This feeling wears off quickly on tour and people start caring less and less about being late and more and more about sleeping in! In Stratford-upon-Avon we visited Shakespeare's birthplace and grave, and wandered along the bank of the Avon river before grabbing a quick lunch.

We arrived in York that evening with a few hours to freshen up and explore before meeting for dinner. Our dinner gave us our first chance to mingle properly which we wasted by all sitting with the people we had been near on the bus. But it was fun watching people start to relax more, which was probably aided by the jug of Pimm's we decided to get for the table.

/Pimm's O'clock /Massive meals

/Private Shop in York

After dinner the whole group went on a Ghost Walk around the streets of York. Our guide was fantastic- really creepy but funny at the same time. We heard some of the more sordid history of the town and although we didn't see any actual ghosts it was a really fun night.

/Shambles

The next day we hit the road again to make our way up to Edingburgh. We stopped at a couple of roadhouses where a few of the boys on the tour bought kilts, as well as stopping to hike up to Hadrian's Wall which offered beautiful views of the countryside. In the afternoon we made it to Edinburgh and went on a short walk with our tour leader Tim who gave us a little bit of direction around the city.

We walked up the Royal Mile and got our first glipse of Edinburgh Castle, then we visited the site of the old gallows which are now surrounded by pubs named after people executed there. Tim told us this pretty remarkable story about Maggie Dickson who was sentenced to be hanged at the gallows but woke up as her body was being transported to the cemetery. Because her sentence had been carried out she was allowed to go free, but the wording of the hanging sentence was subsequently changed to "until dead".

/Missoni Hotel staff uniform

Next we visited Greyfriars church where we heard the sad tale of Greyfriars Bobby, a Skye Terrier who's master died and was buried in the church cemetery. Bobby sat by the grave of his master every day until he died as well and is the only animal buried in the cemetery. The story certainly didn't help lessen the amount that I was missing my own dogs.

/Bobby

After another group dinner and our first Haggis opportunity we headed home to bed.

/Haggis fritters

This post is in danger of becoming overly long again so I will wrap it up. More on the rest of our Topdeck tour next time xx

 

To Market, to Market

On the third day that shereen and I spent together in London we used the remaining hours left on our Original Big Bus Tour pass from the day before to get out to the Tower of London. We had a tour with a Beefeater and saw the crown jewels, and we decided that if we were going to rob the place we would go for the coronation spoon because trying to steal the jewels is unoriginal and they make such a big deal about what Shereen and I could only see as a small gold spoon that has absolutely no further use than to sit in the exhibit looking shiny.

/Shereen's head on a pike at the Tower of London

After the Tower of London we walked across Tower Bridge and over to the Borough Markets for a lunch including Pimm's, a chorizo roll and a duck confit roll which was so good my whole mouth just filled with saliva thinking about it. After the markets we walked along the Thames, past the Globe theatre to TATE Modern where we spent the rest of the afternoon before heading over to Shoreditch. We went to Jamie Oliver's restraunt Fifteen for dinner and both the food and service were really great. Our waiter was very sensitive to the fact that we were on a budget and gave us some great and very tasty suggestions.

/Pimm's o'clock

On our last full day in London we started out by walking from our hostel, through Regent Park, to the Camden Markets. Although they were very buzzing and I liked the area (I hadn't been out to Camden before) the markets were a bit of a let down as it was not as cool and eclectic as I was hoping for but rather a lot of mass produced tourist stuff which was a shame. In fairness it was a Friday rather than a weekend so if you think I should give me a second chance in the future let me know.

It was a bit of a market day as we continued out to Notting Hill where we took in the crazy summer atmosphere of Portobello St. It was very hot, especially in the little antique stores, so after a solid effort there we decided to head to Knightsbridge and walk around Harrods which was nice and airconditioned.

/I wouldn't buy Shereen this bear

It was our last night so we probably should have done something really exciting but we loved Pho so much on our first night that we had to go back!

The next morning we headed off on our Topdeck Tour of England and Scotland. More on that next time xx

 

Loving London

First off I need to explain the huge decrease in posts over the past couple of weeks. I have a Contiki and a Topdeck tour to blame which whilst they have been so much fun, have also been so hectic with very little time set aside in the day for me to do my self important blogging!

So to pick up where I left off in my last post, my friend Shereen arrived early in the morning on my 5th day in London. She had gotten very little sleep on her flight from Perth, mainly due to being stuck on the dreaded aisle seat, but she was a real trooper and didn't let the jet lag stop her from enjoying her first day. First up was the London Dungeons, where we had to wait an hour and a half in the queue. This guy had given us a flyer while we waited in the queue offering discounted "jump the queue" tickets for the London Eye and Madame Tussaud's if we bought them there at the Dungeons. The only reason we didn't say yes straight away was that I had a voucher for "two for one" entry into all three attractions which would have been cheaper for us anyway. After a such a long wait we decided it would be worth it for the Eye as it would be only £5 extra. Unfortunately when we got to the front of the queue and said we wanted the Eye ticket as well the guy informed us that if we had told them when they gave us the flyer we would have been able to jump the Dungeons queue as well! Thanks guy, that info would have been useful an hour and a half ago. But we had fun catching up in the line and playing with Shereen's new DSLR. It takes such good photos that unless we are going swimming there is no need to take my camera out, and Shereen has become my official blog photgrapher/blotographer/phoblographer.

Anyway the dungeons were hilarious. Shereen was very uneasy about all the people jumping out at you from dark corners. I would jump too but then be laughing at Shereen's much more theatrical reaction a second later. We both got completely caught out at the end of the visit, however, by the Hangman's Drop ride. It was one of those rides where they strap you all in a line and you are raised up on a tall pole, then suddenly you all fall back down to the ground. It wasn't that high and I wasn't expecting to be at all scared, but it dropped a second before I expected it and I let off this huge embarrassing scream. A flash of light later we realised they had also caught it on camera. We were laughing so hard at the result in the gift shop it was hard to convey to the shop assistant at we actually wanted to buy it.

After the dungeons we walked on to London Bridge and took a few photos across the Thames, before catching the tube back to the hostel. Shereen did a little urbanspoon-ing/ tripadvisor-ing and found a place off Oxford St. called Pho for dinner. We had spicy green mango salad and it was the best Vietnamese I have ever had.

The next day we woke up early to walk down the street to Madame Tussauds and beat the queue. We spent so long in there, it was kind if ridiculous. But it was just so funny taking photos and watching other people posing with the wax models. I'd love to out up all the photos but there were probably one hundred of them. Friends, look out on my Facebook for more coming soon. After Madame Tussauds we bought tickets on Oxford St. for the Original Double Decker Bus Tour. It was a hop-on hop-off situation and a great way of seeing the city. We got off at Buckingham Palace to take some photos and also got off at the London Eye to use the tickets we had purchased the day before. I have actually never done the Eye before, and I wouldn't say I would do it again, but it was nice to cross off one of those super touristy London things from the list. From the bus we also saw the Houses of Parliament, the Big Ben bell tower, St Paul's Cathedral, the Tower Bridge (which we actually saw open up too- pretty cool), the Tower of London, Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly circus among many other things.

/Jolie-Pitts adopt another baby

/Shereen's dead-on Vanessa Hudgens impression

That night we took a break from being tourists and went to the movies to see Moonrise Kingdom, which is Wes Anderson's new film. He is probably my second favourite director after Tim Burton and I loved this lastest cinematic contribution. If you like your movie humor a little off-centre, go see it.

I have two more days to cover for London, but as you can see we packed a lot in and it takes a while to write about. More on our last days in my next post.

Cheerio xx