2015.08.06 – Oxford – Bristol (England)
We left our hotel around 9:30am. The Travelodge staffs were among the least friendly we encountered during our trip. We took the S3 bus to the train station and boarded our carriage earlier than expected. We needed to transfer and wait exceptionally for 40 mins at the Didcot Parkway station. Upon our arrival, we were directed by friendly tourist volunteer to our Travelodge hotel. Once more our booking was limited to two persons but given the hotel’s configuration, it was quite easy to go by freely. We left our bags at the hotel reception and headed out to explore the city center. We had lunch at a Pizza Express. Jenny really liked their thin crust pizza. We strolled along the very lively wharf area. Bristol seemed to be filled with young families. Shaun, the sheep, was on display everywhere across the city where long line-up of parents waited to have a picture taken of their kids with Shaun. We suspected that the Bristol Hot Air Balloon festival was attracting many families in town. We took a 45 mins cruise on the floating harbor and learned a bit about Bristol’s history. We headed back to the hotel for our check-in. As everyone seemed to be tired, we all took a nap for one or two hours. In the evening, we dropped by a nearby Chinese restaurant. Due to some ordering misunderstanding, we ended up with some extra complimentary BBQ duck. On our way back to the hotel, we stopped at Tesco for water and beer. Jenny did more clothes washing while I booked our train tickets to London.
2015.08.07 – Bristol (England)
Given our hotel room booking limited the number of occupants, we opted to skip the hotel’s breakfast buffet. Instead, we headed to a nearby Whetherspoon Pub (Templar Knight) for breakfast. As we walked by the train station, we picked up our tickets for London. We purchased all-day bus passes and hopped onto route 9 bus which took us the long way to the Clifford Suspension bridge. We spent a few hours around the bridge and at the visitor center. Back in the city center, we visited another Primark. Around 5:30pm we hopped on a bus for Fishponds on a 25 mins ride to visit the Everyday Thai restaurant for supper. We were very pleased with the food, service and overall value. Jenny enjoyed our long bus rides today. From the city center, we walked back to our hotel for a good night rest.
2015.08.08 – Bristol – London (England)
After waking up at 8:00am, we checked-out of our hotel by 9:30am. We had breakfast again at the nearby Whtherspoon pub. The place was overflowing with patrons – it was Saturday! We made good use of our waiting time to catch up on our travel expenditure recording.
We arrived, at the Paddington Train station, the same station we had used coming from Oxford on our way to Bristol a few days ago. As we entered the Tube’s station, we opted to buy our Oyster cards with 10 gbp on each card. We felt confident the amount would take care of our public transportation for a few days. We made our way to the BlackFriars tube station and walked across the Thames river in search of the LSE Bankside House (London School of Economics – student residence). We managed to find the place among all the high-rise buildings in the area. The lobby appeared a bit hectic with a lot of folks coming and going. After settling into our dorm room with three beds, we discovered the toilet was not working very well. We sent an email to Jessica to inform her that we were now in London. On our way out of the residence, we reported at the front desk the toilet issue we had encountered. We had some Tesco sandwiches nearby before heading on our long walk from the Millennium bridge to the Tower bridge and back.
Upon our return, we were asked to change room after the staff confirmed that our toilet was not working properly. Our room was now facing the street. In the evening, we headed out for supper at a nearby Nando’s – one of Victoria’s favorite restaurants. After our meal, we hopped onto a city bus and ended up in the Covent Garden area with the Saturday night crowds. After feeling overwhelmed with the crowds, we headed back to our room with another double-decker bus.
2015.08.09 – London (England)
Our first breakfast at the LSE made our eyebrows raise a bit when we saw a sign limiting our plates to six items. Although there were a small line up for breakfast, the service was really efficient but far from being overly friendly. We were quite surprised by the broad range of patrons in the cafeteria – from young to old. All were obviously seeking good value accommodation in the London city center.
We were scheduled to meet Jessica and Jack at a McDonald’s near the Liverpool tube station. After discovering how quickly our Oyster card balance had disappeared, we opted to take the bus as much as possible instead of the more expensive tube. We arrived for our rendez-vous with them early enough to allow us to explore the area. Jessica and Jack appeared tired after partying the previous evening for Jack’s birthday. We strolled in the nearby lively market streets. We stopped at an outdoor bar for a few beers to kill time before our 5:30pm diner reservation at the 35th floor Sky Garden. As everyone was in need of a washroom break, Jack brought us to his nearby office building for us to use their washrooms. We learned that entry to the Sky Garden floor was actually a free attraction as long as you made a reservation well ahead of time. For restaurant patrons, the visit of the garden was part of the experience. The entrance to the building was almost as extensive as at the airport security screening. We enjoyed taking pictures of the city views. The food was very nice and the service was excellent. After supper, we headed towards the Thames river and bid good night to Jack and Jessica as they were in dire need of some sleep. We walked back to our residence with the intent of heading out for another evening bus ride but once in our room we were a bit tired from our day.
2015.08.10 – London (England)
Our residence cafeteria appeared quieter today – Monday. We were scheduled to meet Jack’s parent today in China town. We took an early bus to the Covent Gardens (again) and caught a street entertainer’s performance. On our walk towards Chinatown we detoured a bit in order to visit the very popular Hamley’s toy store. The restaurant lunch with Jack’s parent was very enjoyable as conversation flowed throughout the meal. We continued our conversation over some coffee and cake at the nearby Cafe Concerto. We bid farewell to Jack’s parent as they had to catch the next train home. As rush hour had begun, Jessica and Jack headed to a tube station to make their way home. In turn, we opted to ride on few more double-decker buses which crisscrossed central London neighborhoods. After returning to the Waterloo bus terminal, we enjoyed our evening walk along the Thames river to our residence. The lights along the river made for beautiful night views.
2015.08.11 – London (England)
After our breakfast, we took a long bus ride to reach Jessica and Jack’s flat. Jessica was eagerly waiting for us as we were 30 mins late. After a short visit of their home, we took the train and tube to our next tourist attraction – Abbey Road. The street crossing, made famous by the Beatles, attracted a constant stream of tourists seeking a photo opportunity. It was quite a challenge to coordinate a crossing among all the tourists doing the same thing. After our pictures taken, we walked over to the Sherlock Holmes museum where we were confronted to a 90 mins wait. We opted to skip this visit after snapping a few pictures from outside. We finished our afternoon with a free visit of the London Museum. The place was extremely busy with bus loads of tourists. We stopped at a Starbucks to kill sometime before our 6:30pm reservation at a nearby Korean restaurant where we would meet up with Jack. The Korean food experience was great while we lingered for sometime at our table. It was raining when we left the restaurant. We bid good night to Jessica and Jack who made their way to their flat.
2015.08.12 – London (England)
After enjoying our last breakfast at our university residence, we headed to meet Jessica at her office in order to collect a few corporate entrance passes to the London Tower. After some respective window shopping, we walked along the busy shopping streets up to the Trafalgar Square where we took the elusive #15 bus to the Tower of London. We saved quite a bit of money with Jessica’s corporate passes. We spent over three hours visiting the impressive Tower of London site.
In the early evening we made our way to a Spanish restaurant where we had made some on-line reservation for 7pm. We had a very nice farewell supper at Camino with Jessica and Jack. We enjoyed a few Happy Hour drinks and two bottles of wine and plenty of tapas. We made our final farewell after crossing the BlackFriar bridge.
2015.08.13 – London (England) – Ottawa (Canada)
Our alarms rang at 5:30am to allow us enough time to pack our luggage. We left our accommodation where we had stayed for the past 5 days. We opted to walk across the bridge to the nearby BlackFriar train station. For awhile, we were not exactly clear where the train would stop within the very long station. In the end, it was easy to board our train for the Gatwick airport. After checking-in our luggage and going through the security screening, we stopped for breakfast at a McDonald as the airport’s Wetherspoon Pub was simply too pricey. We made a few last minutes duty free purchases while waiting for our flight.
The flight appeared a bit long as our attempts to sleep were interrupted by crying children. Nonetheless, we survived once again another flight. Upon our arrival at Montreal’s airport, the custom processing was fairly efficient. After a brief wait for our ParkNFly shuttle bus, we were reunited with our Subaru Forester for the drive home. As we reflected on our latest trip, we were very grateful for the lower prices of our home country! The trip provided Victoria with some great insights into the functioning of many universities that we came across including Trinity College in Dublin, Queen’s University in Belfast, Glasgow University in Glasgow, Cambridge and Oxford. And we even experienced life in a university dorm during our stay in London.