Wednesday, September 19, 2018
I landed in London yesterday afternoon, pretty much on time despite late departure from Vancouver. Nothing noteworthy about the flight, which is a good thing, as if there is anything to say about a long air trip, it’s usually NOT on the plus side.
In the luggage area, I positioned myself next to a tall, strong-looking young man who I asked to heave my suitcase off the conveyor belt, recalling too well last year’s experience at Heathrow, when I put my back out in similar circumstances. This worked as planned, and I went through Customs and on to the Piccadilly Line for the Underground trip to Central London. Conveniently, the Tube route to my hotel in Bloomsbury requires no line changes. However, it is very long and boring. The price is right though — just a few pounds — as compared to the Heathrow Express, which is something like 30 pounds and doesn’t even take you all the way, only as far as Paddington. There were kiosks with vocal promoters of this overpriced service everywhere in the terminal but they didn’t seem to be attracting many customers.
I’m now settled in at my regular London “digs,” the Harlingford Hotel at Cartwright Gardens, a crescent of Georgian buildings, approximately equidistant between Russell Square, Euston and King’s Cross.
Yesterday evening, I went to Carluccio’s in nearby Brunswick Square for dinner. This restaurant has also become one of my London go-tos, serving reliably good Italian food. I had decided by now that I would JUST KEEP GOING, which seems to be the best approach when adjusting to a new time zone. So my plan was to go on a London Walk, as I usually do at least once or twice during a short stay in the city. I had to get to the meeting point at Temple Station, for which the CityMapper app indicated that the quickest way would be Uber. So I thought I’d try it. I had set up an account when I was still in Vancouver for just this purpose. However, as Uber has been kept out of Vancouver, I hadn’t had a chance to try it yet. I was a little apprehensive about getting it wrong somehow — but you have to start sometime. So I put my trip details into the Uber app, and received confirmation from Uber that they were looking for a driver . . . only to have the thing crash with an “Oops, something went wrong. Try again in a few minutes” message. After this happened twice, I gave up and travelled by Tube instead, which required two changes, but the trains were right there, so I arrived quickly. It wasn’t a good start with Uber, though, to say the least.
The walk itself, London’s Hidden Pubs, was very interesting — as they always are — exploring narrow backstreets, pointing out interesting details and colouring it all with historical context and fascinating stories. As the name of the walk indicates, we also visited several pubs, the highlight perhaps being the Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese in Fleet Street, which was rebuilt in 1667, after the Great Fire and proudly displays the names of all the sovereigns — beginning with James II — under whom it has operated. There are at least two bars and a “Chop Room” where in the old days one would go for a mutton chop. It’s a bit of jumble, with many levels and staircases, nooks and crannies — but very atmospheric. Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese has apparently been the regular watering hole for many literary greats, including Samuel Johnson, Oliver Goldsmith and Charles Dickens — and it’s easy to imagine. There’s also a stuffed grey parrot above the bar — the infamous swearing Polly (a favourite phrase was “F*** the Kaiser”) — whose demise in 1926 was reported in newspapers around the world. There’s framed collection of clippings to prove it.
London, Balkans, Berlin 