As most of you know, Trenton travels internationally quite extensively for his work. Because of this, he accumulates more frequent flier miles and hotel points than we typically know what to do with. Not to brag, but the last plane ticket either of us have purchased was when we went to Costa Rica in May of 2007. And that reminds me of another story I can post later. :) Thankfully, his work allows him to keep all of his points for our personal use (one of the very few perks of him being gone so much).
Because of these points, we have had many opportunities to travel and stay basically for free. There have been many weekend trips to Louisville, Indianapolis, Nashville and St. Louis. Our favorite is to go to Huber Orchard and Winery in Starlight, IN for the day and have a night out on 4th Street in Louisville that night. To use up the frequent flier miles, we have gone to West Palm, Key West, Cozumel, Tokyo, Las Vegas, Orlando (twice), Jamaica, and the latest was London. Currently, we have plans to fly to Pensacola, FL in April to visit a friend of ours and run a half marathon with him. Then in July, we are planning a trip to Aruba with an awesome couple we met in Jamaica last year. We are very blessed to have these opportunities yet they do come at the cost of Trenton not being home for many weeks out of the year.
So about London...
Trenton doesn't always give much notice when he is going out of town. Sometimes its a month and sometimes it's two weeks or less. When he found out he was going to London, it was about a month in advance and allowed enough time to plan for me to tag along. There were two other wives going as well so we decided us girls would explore the city while the guys had to work all day. Sounded like a fantastic plan to me!
We left Evansville on Monday, November 14th at 1pm. Because I had to use all of my vacation time, I had to go in to work for 6 hours beforehand which meant I was up at the butt crack of dawn and to work at 5am. Needless to say that by the time I got on the plane in Evansville, I was already tired. However, sleeping at that point was a bad idea considering I had hours and hours of travel time left. We had a layover in Detroit and left there around 6pm. After sitting on the plane forever, and making fun of "Kenny Tarmac" who was sitting a few rows in front of us next to Trent's co-worker and his wife, we finally took off. After drink service, dinner, a movie, some reading, some sleeping and more reading, we were finally there. We arrived at Heathrow airport in London around 7:30am. Keep in mind that London is on GMT which is 6 hours ahead of Evansville. It was a long flight but nothing compared to the flight to Japan. That is a LONG flight!
We waited in one of the restaurants for the last couple to arrive. They are from Brazil but had been in Florida the previous two weeks. Once everyone was there, we got our bearings and took the train (or tube as they call it), all the way out to Loughton. Of course, this was the farthest point in the exact opposite direction. Since we were so far out from the city of London and it's attractions, w all bought Oyster cards for the tube, rather than pay every time. It took over an hour to get there and once there we had to cab it another 10 minutes to the hotel.
Once at the hotel, the guys had meetings in afternoon and a dinner that night. The girls and I decided to stay close to the hotel rather than go into London so we took a cab back into Loughton. It was getting dark so not much time for sightseeing but we did check out the Waltham Abbey Church. Unfortunately, it had just closed when we got there so we were unable to go inside. Looking through the small window on the inner door only gave a glimpse of how really beautiful it was. We walked around the little town but it was mostly dead. We stopped in a pub and had one beer before we moved on. The next pub was packed with locals who most likely go there every night. We ended up staying a few hours and had a really good time talking with everyone and playing ridiculous songs on the jukebox.
Over the course of the next several days, us girls took off into London during the day while the guys had to work. We would get up and eat breakfast with them and head off on our journey for the day. Breakfast was pretty good too. If you are a mushroom fan, they had giant, cooked portobello mushrooms that were delicious! The second night we ate dinner with the guys and some of their work people. I had the fish and chips...a definite must.
So about London and our daily sightseeing. It took around 45 minutes to get into London from out hotel. Once in London, it was a LOT of walking. Considering I had just ran a full marathon the weekend before, my legs were shot by the end of the trip! We saw all of the famous sights like Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace and the Changing of the Guard, The London Eye, The British Museum (the Rosetta Stone was the most famous piece), Piccadilly Circus, the London Bridge, St. Paul's Cathedral, and the Tower of London. The guys were with us Saturday and Sunday as well so they were able to see many of these things too.
Of all the things we did, my favorite was the tour of the Tower of London. We had a Yeoman tour guide explaining all that was around us and what went on inside those walls so many, many years ago. This was the place where prisoners were kept and tortured, people were executed in the Tower Green, royal beasts were held captive for hundreds of years and ravens are protected and held captive as legend states the tower will fall if they ever leave. This is also the home of the historic White Tower and the crown jewels are kept in the Jewel House. Imagine wearing on your head, a crown that has over 3000 diamonds, pearls, sapphires, emeralds and rubies! One single diamond in one crown was slightly larger than a golf ball. I can't remember the exact amount of carats, but it was something ridiculous like 400. They told us before going in not to compare to our engagement rings!
The evenings during the weekend were fun filled with more sightseeing and stops at a pub or two along the way. Dinners were very tasty with the chicken and mushroom pie being my most favorite of the entire trip. The beer was good though served a little too warm (which is the proper way to serve it) for my liking. We couldn't have asked for better weather in November as it was partly sunny during the days with highs around 45-50. The nights were a little cooler but nothing a scarf and gloves couldn't fix. I had a fantastic time and am glad I was able to join the trip.
