And now for something completely different.
One highlight of our trip was the lack of complaining from our kids about the weather. If we had come from L.A. where it is sunny and warm it would have been a problem, but since the weather in London is dark and damp like Denmark, the kids took it in stride.
Another highlight of the trip was our
hostel. We were able to get a family room, which meant two sets of bunk beds and our own bathroom. Wii was available in the main lobby any time no one was watching a rugby match, so at 7 a.m. Arlo was entertained allowing Robin to sleep or read. The kitchen was clean and fully stocked (minus an oven, which we learned after buying a pizza at a grocery store a few blocks away). The staff answered our endless stream of questions and even sorted through their change to help add to Arlo's growing coin collection, including the
Shield of Royal Arms set.
It was great to visit London without the jet lag. We arrived, took our stuff to the hostel, and headed over to the
London Eye. With discount tickets from the hostel we were able to skip the queue, but we did see the 4-D movie (was the fourth dimension time since it took a while to watch it? or should we assume it was the wind, the bubbles, and fog?). When we finally made it onto the Eye the sun was just setting, which was great. We were able to enjoy the view in the daylight initially and also evening views with all the lights later. We even saw some fireworks, which were for delayed
Guy Fawkes Night celebrations.
We enjoyed time with friends and visited the
Tate Britain and
Tate Modern and took the
boat between the two. We spent an entire day with a friend at the
Science Museum followed by a fantastic dinner at a vegetarian Indian restaurant. By now we were getting our fill of museums, but we did have a little time in the
British Museum. Arlo was excited to hold a coin from 400 B.C. and we all saw the Rosetta Stone, which is the same shape as our computer language program's icon. The bad news was that we got lost leaving the museum, but the good news was that we found the Oxfam used book store and a place to buy fish and chips, minus the fish.
We had a received a tip to take the bus instead of the Underground, but were skeptical. We gave it a try and were completely won over. We saw many places we weren't going to visit this time and got to see the lights above Regent Street. If we hadn't taken the bus we would never had known there was an Apple store (THE same one mentioned by Steve Jobs in his recent talk) near the seven-storey toy store. Visiting
Hamleys and the Apple store made us feel like we were on vacation, especially when Robin got to be among the first to try the new
Xbox Kinect.
We wrapped up our trip with a visit to Trafalgar Square (no more pigeons!!) and a production of
The Lion King. It was sad and scary, but not like anything we had seen before.
I'll confess that one my favorite parts of the trip was being able to read the headlines on papers as we walked by a store. We had little conversations with random people and we could understand everything people said to us. But it is good to be home, too.
p.s. If you are interested in more pictures let me know and I'll send you a link.
Can you imagine a class of American nine-year-olds being taken to a game preserve, having a deer killed for them, having the deer skinned in front of them, and then bringing back the skull, skin, and a couple feet? It sounds a bit like the digression in a Tom Lehrer song. You may remember an earlier post showing the people at the after-school program dealing with the skin.
There is very little over-the-counter medicine (children's acetaminophen, nyquil), but the pharmacy sells items like lotion, throat lozenges, and facial tissues. When I visited the pharmacy this week there were Christmas decorations (no surprise) and little bottles of Christmas schnapps (surprise). I think this could be a marketing idea to take back to the U.S.
At David's institute they believe in preventative health care. Each day each department receives a fruit basket and employees are supposed to eat a piece of their choice (I think the pineapple is an unusual addition).
Another highlight of the trip was our hostel. We were able to get a family room, which meant two sets of bunk beds and our own bathroom. Wii was available in the main lobby any time no one was watching a rugby match, so at 7 a.m. Arlo was entertained allowing Robin to sleep or read. The kitchen was clean and fully stocked (minus an oven, which we learned after buying a pizza at a grocery store a few blocks away). The staff answered our endless stream of questions and even sorted through their change to help add to Arlo's growing coin collection, including the Shield of Royal Arms set.
I'd love to post about our trip to London, but I am trying to decide whether to break with the Danish theme. The countries do have a few things in common, like Viking raids. In modern life both countries have switches on their outlets, as described by a friend on sabbatical in New Zealand. Neither country uses the Euro, making it fun for coin collectors. The U.K. and Denmark have traffic signals that go from green, to yellow, to red, and then before the green cycles back the yellow comes on again to let you know it is time to shift (I haven't seen any automatic shift cars in Denmark). Not only is Denmark a great country for cycling, they help extend the life of your car's clutch, too. As for those of you wondering, the license plates are similar, too. The significant difference is that the Danish plates are metal and the English plates seem to be fiberglass.
