Day 6 was a traveling day for us. Like I said before, I wish I had thought about how much time you lose traveling and added a few more days to the trip to make up for it. This was NOT a fun traveling day.
Getting ready to board our flight.
A view of Berlin from the air. Zoom in and you can see the German TV tower.
Enjoying the window seat for the very short two hour flight.
Note to self: Pay a little more for a better airline next time. :)
If I don't think about the fact that we're being shuttled hundreds of miles per hour through the sky, flying would freak me out. However, seeing all the clouds and endless blue skies helps to balance that out.
I don't have a lot of photos from the moment we landed at Gatwick airport to when we arrived at our Airbnb. The process of getting from Gatwick to central London was a bit crazy if you're not accustomed to it. I think if I had to do it all over again, I'd have a different opinion of it. There were hoards of people everywhere, trying to get to where they needed to go. We managed to take a train into central London, and from there we were able to buy our travel cards (we bought Oyster cards later for getting around to other zones). If you bring a passport sized photo, you can also get 2 for 1 attraction deals. We ended up using this on the London Eye and also got a discount on a river boat cruise.
Once we sorted out how we would get around London, we made our way on the Jubilee line towards Surrey Quays - and yes, I'm sure you pronounced that just the way I did when I first saw it. Apparently, it's pronounced Surrey "Keys". Our first stop was this shopping center near our Airbnb. Here, we received further confirmation that Europe is not a fan of air conditioning. I can't even imagine what it's like when it gets REALLY hot in Europe. I don't want to know. There was a food court upstairs at the shopping center, so we decided to grab lunch there. I opted for the most British looking place in the food court, and ended up getting this sandwich with coronation chicken. London lesson #1: "coronation" probably means "chicken with raisins". It wasn't bad - kinda like chicken salad...but with raisins. I liked how they cut up the sandwich into four little pieces. It made me feel like I got more food for my 8 pounds. By the way, that's around 12 U.S. dollars which, in my opinion, is highway robbery for this sandwich and a soda. Welcome to London!
We saw this bar/restaurant every time we left the house or were on our way home. I was surprised we never stopped here. It was always very lively in the evenings.
Our subway station.
I've heard of Piccadilly Circus before, but wasn't quite sure what it was. I wasn't sure if it was an area, an actual building, or something completely different altogether. It turned out to be London's version of Time's Square. Only the buildings are older, it's more compact, and there aren't as many large LCD screens everywhere. I didn't care for Piccadilly Circus as I found it too touristy. It really is like Times Square because it's nice to walk through to say you've been there, but you definitely don't want to hang around.
There were just hoards of people lulling about. I guessed that they were just interested in people watching. I did not want to stay in this area.
I wonder if people actually use these red phone booths, or if they just keep them around because they are so iconic.
Our requirements for dinner were that it be something we don't have back at home, and that it was nearby to where we were since we were all starving. Wagamama, it is!
I miss ice. :) And Diet Coke!
We decided to spend the rest of the evening just scouting locations to photography in the next couple of days. Around this time, the sun doesn't set til almost 10pm! That took some getting used to. It was nice to have extra daylight hours, but when you're waiting to take long exposures, it sucks to have to wait that long for the sun to set!
Speaking of photos, my DSLR did not make an appearance on this day. It was the G7x all the way!
Is it morbid that I wonder how many people got hit by cars that prompted the painting of these signs?
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