England, March 2022

Our family of four (kids 15 and 10) just returned from a trip March 18-26. My wife and I have been to London before, but our kids had never been. York was new to all of us. A few thoughts:
1. We landed in London, took the train to York where we spent a few days, returning by train to spend our final 4 days in London. We had an absolute blast!
2. Covid infection rates in England spiked horribly the week we were there (it was down for a while across England but BA.2 variant is pushing numbers up quickly). Mask wearing is not happening much in York or London. Our experience was less than 10% mask wearing in public, and only slightly higher on the Tube in London.
3. We wore our masks a lot. However, we took the Tube, rail service and other public transport. We tried to eat at street markets for lunch where we could (e.g., Canopy Market and Greenwich Market in London, and Shambles Market in York) to avoid too many times where we dined inside with others. We benefitted from great weather which made a lot of outdoor activity and walking a good option too.
4. The return test process was very easy. Before leaving home we booked ExpressTest at their Kensington High Street location. Their staff was great, test took less than 10 minutes, and results back for lateral flow test in under 40 minutes (we walked down the street and hung out in Kensington Gardens while we waited for the results). Not the cheapest option but we appreciated having someone administer this for us and get the results to us quickly and efficiently with an easy to use "fit to fly" certificate that we then uploaded to our United Airlines app the night before our flight.
5. We debated going or not a lot before we left home, especially seeing the infection rate heading the wrong direction just before we headed out. Once we made up our mind, we focused on our strategies to try to minimize the number of times we'd be in a situation to be exposed, even though that's very hard to do. We were fortunate of course not to get "stuck" after a positive test but feel we had a good plan to minimize the number of times we were in crowded places, to wear masks a lot, etc. At a certain point, we felt we had to either cancel and wait this out a little more or adopt a good plan and hope for the best. We chose the latter and it worked out.
6. We found great AirBnb options in both York and London (just near Holland Park tube station). Sufficient for our family and both in excellent locations which made a huge difference.
7. York Minster was wonderful of course as well as the Shambles and York's museums, but our favorite activity was just walking the City Walls. There are quiet areas, neighborhood pubs, and so forth that are just outside the tourist crush if you walk the walls away from the Minster/Shambles. We stayed near Micklegate Bar, very near the train station but far enough away from the center to make it a little quieter option but only 10 minutes walk to the center. Lovely pubs in that area, convenient market, etc.
8. London was full of people everywhere enjoying sunshine and spring warmth. Tower of London, St. Paul's, Trafalgar Square, etc. were great, but we really loved Greenwich (Cutty Sark, Greenwich Market) and the relative quiet found around Holland Park where were staying.
9. I am so envious of the train systems in England. We have nothing of the sort in the US. Going back and forth from York/London, we met people who were visiting one or the other city just as a day out with friends. Impossible for most of us here in the US.
10. I took pictures all week with a theme - pubs. I love the signs, the names, the ambiance of so many. We enjoyed meals or drinks at several in both York and London (favorites included King's Arms along river in York, The Swan in York, or The Castle in Holland Park).
We are so glad we went. Like a lot of us, we have had trips cancelled and it was nice to get this one in (even it still isn't "normal" just yet). Cheers!
Steve