Background
In July, 2016, Mike and Karen Tipton accompanied by their friends Schuyler Brower and Marcia Taylor, took off for about three weeks to visit the United Kingdom. The main goal of the trip was 10-day charter (hire) of a “narrowboat” (60-foot long x 7.5-foot beam canal boat) to travel from Middlewich in Cheshire to LLangollen in Wales along the Shropshire and LLangollen canals. In addition, we would visit London. After the canal trip the Tiptons would split off and go to Wales while the Brower/Taylors would head to Scotland. We departed the USA on July 19 and returned on August 9. The dates were chosen to escape the summer heat of the Arkansas Ozarks. The Tiptons both turned 69 during this trip. The other couple were a bit younger and a bit older.
My plan was to go by narrowboat from Middlewich to LLangollen. The distance is about 55 canal miles with 26 locks, 10 drawbridges, two aqueducts, and three tunnels. I chose this route because I wanted to go through the famous Chirk Tunnel and over the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. My research indicated that the route should be “easily” doable in 10 days. In the event that was wildly optimistic!
There are hundreds of miles of canals all over Great Britain. There were built in the late 18th century and early 19th century. They provided the transportation needs of the country in the run-up to and during the industrial revolution. They were only fully replaced by the railway in the mid-20th century.
My plan was that we would spend two nights in London prior to heading out to pick up our narrowboats. The two nights would give us time to de-jetlag and provide buffer for possible airline issues.
London
Our plane arrived Heathrow terminal 5 on time and after an uneventful trip through immigration and customs we took the Heathrow express to Paddington Station. At Paddington we purchased Oyster Cards and took the underground to Euston Square station which was nearest (without a complicated routing) to our hotel at Euston. We got to the hotel pretty much without problems. But several issues should be mentioned:
Even though there are escalators from the bowels of the underground to near the surface this does not mean that there not a lot of steps to be climbed also. Most of the underground stations are not “accessible”. It was very embarrassing when a stranger grabs your bag and carries it up the last flight of steps for you. It is even more embarrassing when it is a young woman who does it!
If you find that you are going the wrong way on the underground get off at the next stop and go the other direction.
Even with a map with a GPS it is sometimes difficult to associate your location on the ground with the location indicated on the map. Street names in London are not well marked and sometimes change from block to block.
We got checked in and situated. Our friends arrived shortly thereafter. They handled the potential problems by taking a cab from the airport to the hotel!
My plan for the afternoon was to have tea at Fortnum and Mason. My wife and I had had tea at Fortnum and Mason and greatly enjoyed it. So that is what we did, after a side excursion to see Buckingham Palace. Tea at Fortnum and Mason was expensive (expected) and not as good as we remembered. But we enjoyed ourselves. After tea we explored the famous food halls of Fortnum and Mason. The food halls at Fortnum and Mason and Harrods are really fun to explore, more fun than some of the museums. They are not your local supermarket or Wal-Mart!
Pictures are at https://goo.gl/photos/UzXb1e3GEhhNGMaTA
Most of these pictures have captions. If you click on the "i" that is somewhere on the page you should be able to read them.