Day 1
After a 10 hour flight I arrived in London on Friday at 10:30am London time. There is a 6 hour time difference between Texas and London. The flight was fine, but when I arrived there was a really long line to get through customs. Krista and her friend were picking me up at airport. My phone did not work at all and I had no way to get ahold of Krista to let her know where I was or that the terminal number had changed. There is really no way to explain how all the details got worked out except to say God was in control. When I finally got through customs, and claimed my luggage at the largest airport in the world, Krista and LeeAnn were waiting for me. Nothing but a miracle that they found me! Anyway after a crazy drive, (the whole drive on wrong side of street is a little freaking to me) we made it to Krista's flat. It is your typical London flat.....Small! But it is cute... If you ever saw the movie "Notting Hill".... Krista flat looks just like Hugh Grant's . Except smaller!
Leeann left us so we could settle in and after a quick change of clothes...off we went to explore the neighborhood. We walked a lot. But I have discovered it you don't like walking you shouldn't come to London. That is the major form of transportation. We walked through several parks and got to the Putney area. We found a really cool looking pub and went in and ate fish and chips. The food was delicious. I definitely know now why London is famous for their fish and chips! We walked to a unique retail area and spent the rest of the afternoon shopping/dreaming. I chose to limit my purchases because it was a long walk back. However, I did manage to buy several boxes of cadbury chocolates. After toting what seemed to be about 5 pounds of chocolate, I was ready to stop and eat them along the way because I am so out of shape....oh the irony...anyway....We made it back to the flat around 7 pm the chocolate still in the package. I was beginning to feel those 6 hours that I lost somewhere over the ocean so we visited a little more and I went to bed.
Day 2
We woke up early....still adjusting to time change. After my morning tea, which Krista has become an expert in preparing, we went to breakfast at a neat little cafe in the neighborhood. Krista had planned a big day of sightseeing and the day did not disappoint! We rode the bus to central London. At the Westminster station we bought tickets for one of the local tour buses. The tour bus took us all around central London. We saw all the famous sites....Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, London Bridge, Westminster Abbey, Hyde Park, Trafalgar Square, and Kensington Gardens. It was a super fun day! One of the cool unexpected sites was the Texas Embassy. Right in the middle of all the action is a restaurant that used to be the Texas Embassy back in the early days when Texas was its own country. It has now been turned into a great authentic Tex-mex restaurant. I do believe this discovery may make Krista's next few months here much easier. The food was wonderful. We were the only Texans in the place. We know that because everyone in there thought our accents were hilarious. Anyway it was a fun experience. After taking pictures by the Texas A&M sign and UT flag, we were on our way with a smile on our face and full of the best tex-mex in all of Europe! We did more sightseeing on a river cruise down the Thames, then a bus ride back to flat. I am told that 12 million people live in the London area. It seems like we saw most of them today. It is very crowded! But, I'mdisappointed that there was no Elizabeth, William and Kate sightings. They must be on holiday too. Perhaps, we will run into them later in the trip. In the evening We watched a futbol game at a sports pub next to Krista's house. Ate some more, which does seem to be theme of this trip, then we went to bed!
