back from my trip

I am back in town. We had a good trip to England, Paris and a bad time in London. Did my best to be an embarrassment to my 16 year old grandson and think I did a good job there.

I am still a bit jet lagged this morning and sadly have to head to the office (someone has to pay for this trip).

First stop was my wife's home town in the midlands we we visited family. Then it was off on the EuroStar to Paris.

Paris was great but a bit overcrowded at the places we visited. We saw Notre-Dame, Arc de Triumph, the Musee d'Orsay, Eiffel tower and of course a trip to the Louvre. Ate too much and had more wine than I should. We did the city mostly on foot and my grandson figures we walked 16 miles the first two days (then I looked up the metro and everyone agreed we'd walked enough and I started buying T-tickets) I found the Louvre to be very overcrowded a hard to really see or appreciate anything. The d'Orsay was in my opinion a better museum and handled the crowds better (and had some great art in it's collection). We did make it out to Versailles but while interesting the long lines and crowds took away from the experience. Although one of our best meals was at the restaurant at Versailles (it was also the most expensive). If you're ever in Paris, we decided our favorite restaurant was "Central City" on rue Cler.

We took the Eurostar back to London and saw the changing of the guard, Trafalgar Square, the National Gallery and Churchill's war cabinet rooms (if you have any interest in WWII history you have to see this) on the first day.

Two bad things marred the trip. When we arrived in London we found that the hotel we had booked wasn't anything better than a flea bag (and I mean a real, sh*&$@ hole). We really failed in our research here by trusting one guide book and a quick look at their web site - very much a case of false and misleading advertising. I ended up moving us to another, better hotel. That was a real downer and more work than I wanted.

The second bad thing was that my wife was a victim of a pickpocket on the Underground and had her wallet stolen on our way back to our hotel. We were shocked and stunned by the loss. We had been so careful in Paris to protect ourselves but by London we were tired and had let our guard down. We ended up spending the evening calling police and credit card companies. Not exactly the lesson I wanted to teach my grandson but it got taught and he proved to be a trooper. I'll be most more about the trip, with pictures on my blog later this weekend (when I've recovered).

We spent the second day in London locked up in our hotel room resting, recovering from the shock of the theft and more phone calls with the occasional foray down to the hotel restaurant and into Padington Station to replace our stolen train tickets.

On the health side I found that I did have some trouble keeping up with the pace, often found my tummy upset (more than on other trips overseas) and can now ask for a toilet in three different languages, but on the whole I held up fine.

Now we are back home and I have to turn my attention to matters of life - work, more calling to credit card companies and banks. And tomorrow I have to get blood drawn for my first post treatment PSA test. I have an appointment with my Uro next week to get the results and see what the follow up plan is from here.

It was great to get away but also good to be home.

Other than the little bad parts. sounds like was a great trip! I'm jealous!

One of these days we really have to go to Europe!

Glad too, that you all are safely back home in the good old US of A. Yeah, too bad about the hotel and theft experience, that's a good way to ruin the trip. The long lines in Paris are well known, and would deter me from wanting to do that. Same reason I would never go to Disney World again, waiting 90 minutes to go on a single ride standing in the sun isn't what I call fun.

Sounds like a good trip overall. Now back to the world of reality, work, and your PSA. Hoping you score a big fat zero on that part, you deserve it.

Best wishes,

David in SC

So dreadfully sorry to hear of the pick-pocketing on the Tube, shame on them!
Sounds like the rest of your trip was great though and wishing you all the best with your PSA test.

I was in London about 20 years ago and the war rooms was one of my favorite sites, it's a fascinating place to visit. The other was the display of historical documents in the British Museum.

Before we got married my wife and I did a trip to Boston (to visit a friend) and spent a couple of days on Nantucket Island. She lost her wallet while we were touring the island on bikes. When we called the police station they said that someone had reported that they found it and would turn it in to the police later that afternoon on their way to work. We checked frequently but it was never turned in so we eventually had to cancel the credit cards and replace everything when we got home. It was also a time when we didn't have a lot of money so the loss of cash from the wallet made the trip a little bit tighter. 15 years later we received her wallet in the mail from the Nantucket police dept. There was explanation with it but obviously it had been turned in and they had misplaced it.

Pickpockets are a pain - I've seen them at work in Paris. The work in pairs, they pick you out when you get on the train, wait till the train is about to open the doors at a stop, one distracts you (maybe bumps into you), the other lifts you valuables from purse or knapsack, train doors open, then they exit and disappear.

Good to hear you had a mostly enjoyable time. Welcome back