Day 20

Today we left Edinburgh to go to London. As always, we got up early to go checkout, get our deposit back, and find our way to the airport. We decided not to take the steps of doom this time, having discovered a much more luggage friendly way of getting to the bus terminal. Unfortunately the wifi on the bus didn’t work so well this time so boo.

We arrived at the airport and checked into our flight and then settled in for the flight. We were slightly delayed departing and slightly delayed landing but the flight was only about twenty minutes late overall. Upon arriving in London, we had to get in contact with the private transport company to take us to the hotel. We gave them a call, and they said that they would get the driver to call us back. However, being the nice people we are, we thought that we would go to where all the other taxis are. 

This was a stupid idea in the end for two reasons. Firstly, to get to the taxis, you have to go under what I assume is the car park. Either way, it’s big, concrete, and prevents any phone signals from getting in. When we finally realised this and got to a place where we could get reception, we found out that he was meeting us back at the arrivals area...

MacGyver Sandra

The car took us to our apartment. Sandra and I went up to reception (about 200 m up the road from the apartment) to check in. There was a bit of a queue and only one receptionist so it took a little bit. The receptionist seemed to be having a bad day, and although she was civil, was not particularly nice.... The apartment here was not as nice as the one in Edinburgh, and was also more expensive. 

There was wifi, and a network cable (although we had to fix the network port - thank you mini tool kit/torch combo), but you needed a username and password to access the net. Ok, off to the not-so-nice receptionist again to ask about the internet and for an extra key. There was a queue again and still only one receptionist so we decided to come back later.

Dental win!

We settled into the apartment and then headed off to explore the area and find a supermarket to get some stuff for dinner and lunches for the next few days. Sandra found an Asian supermarket and got super excited about it. 

During our travels, mum had been complaining about a filling that had dropped out leaving behind a fairly chipped tooth that was causing her some pain. Luckily for us, there was a dentist right near our apartment and he had an availability in 45 minutes time. Score, how lucky is that! So mum went in and got that patched up while the rest of us went to the supermarket.

We figured it was also time to get our Oyster cards (public transport cards) sorted so that we could use the tube. Sandra went into the train station to buy them but that particular station didn't sell them and directed Sandra to a shop across the road. Sandra figured we’d put 10 pounds each on them, but the guy recommended 5 pounds would be enough for the time that we were there so we thought we would trust the local. 

We went back to the apartment and put the shopping away. We walked back up to reception again and there was still a queue so we decided we would come up again after dinner. Mum came back to the apartment but it was still too early for dinner so we headed out again. Our apartment was really close to Hyde Park so we thought we would go for an evening stroll in the park as it was still light outside. As soon as we walked through the gate it started drizzling. As much as we enjoy walking in the rain, we decided to investigate the other half of the main street and leave the walk in the park for better weather. 

We found a cinema, and were hoping to go see “The last airbender’ but it appears that it’s no longer showing... Fail. I know it got bad reviews, but the cartoon of it was so awesome I have to see it! We also found quite a few more dentists up the street. So turns out it was more good odds than luck that we found a dentist for mum. Maybe this is just a part of London that has poor dental hygiene?

Our adventures had separated us from the folks so we headed back to the apartment. We thought we would stop by reception (for the third time) and there were finally two receptionists and only one other person in reception so hurrah! Turned out that the parents had been in there just before us (the girl that served us was quite young and described mum as my aunt or grandma - hilarious!) and had already picked up the second key. 

Hard at work...

We weren't so lucky with the internet unfortunately as it turned out that the company that sets up the internet wasn’t around, and we had to wait for them to come back the next day. We did make the effort to go to an Internet Cafe so that we could let our mates in London (Stevo and Row) know that we were there. 50p for 30 min. Not bad.