London, Revisited

We woke to cool weather in Ireland, but it was only 4:30 am.  We got our stuff together and headed to our bus stop, about 3 blocks away.  Our bus came a few minutes after we got there and took us to the airport.  We dropped off our bags, headed through security (wearing our shoes), and stopped for breakfast.  We made it to the gate with plenty of time to spare.  The plane was an A319 with 3-3 seating.  It was not very full, so we had two seats together by ourselves.  The plane landed roughly on time and we did not have to go through customs.

The plane flew into Gatwick airport, which is quite a ways south of London.  We were able to get a train ticket into the city that included a 1 day Underground pass for only a quid more.  The train took us into Victoria station, which we had been to several times.  We made it to our hotel just after noon and checked into our room.  We are staying the same place we stayed last week and the staff recognized us and seemed happy to see us.

Our hotel is on this street.

A church near our hotel.

It was interesting to see Google's doodle today recognize the accomplishments of Rosalind Franklin.  I found it fun to read that she was born in Notting Hill, near our hotel.

Our plan was to visit the National Gallery and get lunch along the way.  We got sandwiches at Subway and ate them in the subway as we waited for our train, which came as we finished eating.  Subs were the way to go today.

We walked through Trafalgar square to get to the museum.  The square was packed with people, a precursor for what we experienced in the museum.  Despite the crowds, we saw some great masterpieces from Cezanne, Van Gogh, Manet, Monet, Serrat, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Rubens, Van Eyck, Da Vinci, to name a few.  Amy's favorite was Music in the Tuilleries by Manet.

After leaving the museum, we headed to a knitting store.  Part of our route took us through Green Park where there was a gun salute for the recent Royal baby.  We also shopped along the way.  We came to Harrod's again and decided to do some additional shopping.  It is quite an amazing store and we saw quite a bit more tonight than last time.  It is a bit like Meijer, with just about everything, except very upscale.  Today we walked through the pet area and saw dog collars for 250 pounds.  Amy was impressed by the full sized Santa made from Legos.

The crepe restaurant we ate at the other day was so good and close to where we were, we stopped there for dinner.  Once again the crepes were great.  A quick walk brought us to the tube station, and we took the train to our hotel stop.

Well, this was our last full day together in Europe.  Amy flies home tomorrow and I head off to two conferences in The Netherlands.  It has been a great trip so far.  Amy was a big help navigating the Scottish roads - I could not have seen all the things I did without her help!  While there is always more to see and do, I was able to accomplish everything and more than when I originally planned this research trip.