Trip Report-November in London, the Christmas Edition

Day 1 Monday.

Gladys, Mark and Lori live in Brandon, Manitoba and so they had an extra long travel day starting with a 2-hour drive to Winnipeg and then a 2-hour flight to Calgary to meet us for the flight to London. One surprise regarding their flight from Winnipeg to Calgary; the gate agent asked for their proof of ETA before being allowed on the plane. Luckily Mark had the emails on his phone. None of us were asked in Calgary.

The initial plan was explode out of the gates and get to touring, but it was a sleepless flight for 2 out of 5 and so when we got to our 3-bed/3 bath apartment in Fulham via https://corporateblackcabs.co.uk/ for £95 plus parking fee of £11.50 it was decided not much else was going to happen except for groceries and going out to eat. I’d give a link to the apartment however it is currently not on Airbnb’s site. More on that later. Here’s a link to its location instead https://maps.app.goo.gl/h9CRChDQXBysj3xM6.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t want to stay in Fulham and its because of my uniformed biases. When I searched for images of the area it showed redbrick row houses and my imagination got the best of me because it looked very similar to the unflattering neighbourhoods in Birmingham featured in the English gangster TV show Peaky Blinders. However, we found it a charming, family-oriented neighbourhood where we saw moms and dads walking their kids to school or daycare every morning. I really wanted to stay closer into town, but finding a 3-bedroom place that wasn’t a ridiculous price was tough. There was a full-size grocery store 10 minutes away, a beautiful walking path along the river which was spectacular at night, and a traditional English pub nearby where we ate that first night. The Imperial Wharf Overground station was also a 5-minute walk from our door so access to the city was not an issue. Two thumbs up for the neighbourhood if you’re looking for something quieter.

The apartment was as advertised in the photos and we have no complaints, however with my minimal experience with Airbnb’s I learned a few things that I want to avoid if there is a next time. I knew going in that somebody lived there but had moved out for our stay, but we all still felt odd when we opened drawers and cupboards and found other people’s stuff such as clothes and shoes. I know that’s the concept behind Airbnb, but I didn’t like it and will try to avoid that in the future, possibly we’ll try VRBO (I’ve never used before, but it advertises as homes that aren’t lived in). But the biggest complaint we had and didn’t find out until the ‘owners manual’ became available to us the day before check-in is that the key pick-up was a lockbox attached to a fence hidden below a bush about a 5-minute walk from the place. After we got the keys, we realized there was only one set. I messaged the host to ask if we could get a 2nd set and she said that would be £15, plus a £100 deposit and I could pick up the keys at a small corner store that was a 15-minute walk away. This all seemed odd because we noticed when we arrived that the building had a 24-hour concierge office. Why weren’t the keys left there? Well, according to the owner’s manual; and this wasn’t disclosed to us before; Airbnb’s are not allowed in this building and the manual stated not to let anyone know we were renting through the platform.

In any case none of this ruined our stay. We liked the apartment, loved the neighbourhood, but it’s got me rethinking the Airbnb thing-not that we use it often anyway. Just wait until you read my Day 10-Wednesday section.

Day 2 Tuesday

Everyone got some sleep and we’re off. While putting together a list of must-sees in London for a newbie, the top of my list was Westminster Abbey and the Tower of London. After a walk near Buckingham Palace to wave to the King we made our way to the Abbey for our 1:00 time slot. I was excited about seeing the Queen’s Galleries which hadn’t been opened when I was here in 2018. A lot has changed since then in the way it can be toured. First was a different entrance, and now a handy tablet guide is available, and a 1-way path through the church to see the sites. The tablet does a pretty good job of pointing out the highlights. However, the star of the show-at least to me was the Queen’s Galleries. It’s only £5 more on top of the pricey entrance fee, which is too bad, I would have loved to go back another day but not if I had to pay the Westminster Abbey entrance fee again. As usual, I can linger in a museum all day, but the other 4/5ths of my party don’t have nearly the love of museums that I do and weren’t as excited to see blueprints and conceptual drawings from the 1700’s of potential alterations to the towers of Westminster, or forged documents by Monks to prove ownership of lands including the monastery that the Abbey is on. Apparently, it wasn’t uncommon for the sneaky monks to do such things.

We probably spent close to three hours at Westminster and then we headed toward the Mayfair area for the primary purpose of this trip, to start seeing Christmas lights. Let me tell you, if you’ve got a Christmas Crankypants in your family, bring them to London in Nov/Dec. If this doesn’t change their attitude, then there is no hope. The highlight for me was Selfridges Department store-inside and out. It had a Disney theme in all its store windows, and the interior of the store was decorated like I’ve never seen. Ironically, while Selfridges was decked out for a Disney Christmas, the Disney store a couple of blocks away barely had a decoration. We walked up and down various streets enjoying the lights, including the famous angels on Regent Street. One other highlight on Regent Street that I wanted to see was green plaque showing the location of a piece of Canadian History. I actually did a post about it during the pandemic https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/general-europe/the-silly-things-that-amuse-me. The plaque recognizes this as the site that the Stanley Cup was bought in 1892 and brought to Canada to crown the champions of hockey. In my post I mentioned that it was probably one of those places that was of interest to me and nobody else. I was right, not t even my hockey loving brother-in-law was as excited as me to see the plaque. But now I can take it off my bucket list.

Day 3 Wednesday

The only planning Mark and Lori did on their own in advance was to book a bus tour to Stonehenge and Bath. It was a long day for them as they left the apartment at 6:30am and got back after 8pm. The rest of us headed to the National Portrait Gallery to start our day. Carla calls it the “all about Allan day” because it was things on my list that nobody really cared about, however Carla and Gladys did manage to create their own interest with the paintings by admiring and talking about the clothing. I remember them being fascinated in 2018 at the Fashion Museum in Bath. While that was actual clothing, they still managed to find delight here with paintings with clothing. I spent most of my time in the Tudor Gallery and after a while it dawned on me that there was enough info in here to create plenty of soap operas. Too bad somebody already thought of my idea as The Tudors and The Bridgerton’s are both available via streaming. I could have made millions. Maybe I should submit a script based on the portrait of The Chevalier d’Éon, a French cross dresser born a male who spied for France, fenced in a dress and was legally proclaimed a woman by King Louis XVI after threats of blackmail.

Next up was the Treasures of the British Library. Once again it started out as a big yawn from Carla and Gladys, but it is after all, “All about Allan Day.” The history of books and the art of books is shown in all its glory in this gallery. The Lindisfarne Gospels was what I was most interested because of my love of the book and tv series “The Last Kingdom”. Part 1 of our England tour in 2022 followed the path of the Vikings and King Alfred, and sometime in the future part 2 of my Viking tour will have us heading north including the monastery on the Island of Lindisfarne in Northern England. The Gallery is far more then old gospels though; one fascinating letter caught my eye written by Alan Turing in 1952 discussing the possibility of Artificial Intelligence.

Day 4 Thursday

This was one of the days I’d left unplanned in case Mark and Lori spoke up about wanting to see something. I don’t like not having a plan, but in the spirit of family and fairness I figured I shouldn’t dominate the schedule. We did however, book tickets last night to see Moulin Rouge, luckily, we found 5 seats together in the 5th row of the upper tier for £55 each. I was surprised that on a Thursday night in November, a show that has been running for 4 years would almost be sold out. It was an eye opener for future planning. I’ve been wanting to see Mousetrap since our visit 7 years ago, but Moulin Rouge was highly recommended by our daughter, and Carla really wanted to see it. Right after booking I tried to book Mousetrap for one of the few evenings, we had left free, but we couldn’t find 5 seats together, and that shows been playing since 1952-28,000 performances. Next time? Moulin Rouge was outstanding, and the theatre was decorated brilliantly, however I almost had to leave at intermission because there was so little leg room that my knees were in pain. That left me wondering if the theatre is for me in the future.

Prior to the show we did a lot of wandering starting from Victoria Station and walking east along the river. London was in a cold spell with highs of about 5C with occasional showers and wind, so it wasn’t the most pleasant day/week to be outside but that’s what you get for planning a November visit. We eventually made our way to the Borough Market which has been in this spot for 800 years. I loved the look of the area with its old dirty, worn brick, but as far as the market goes, we were unimpressed. It was crowded, noisy and just another market. Without the history behind it I don’t get the attraction. It was a one-and-done for us.

Next stop was the Roman Amphitheatre underneath the Guildhall Yard. It had been on my list for a long time, and I thought it was another thing that might be of interest to our European newbies. It’s free, you don’t need much time to see it and its worthwhile if you’re in the neighbourhood. Up to this point, I really wanted to visit a few museums, but Mark and Lori hadn’t expressed any interest and I had no idea if seeing something like this would be enjoyable. As it turns out if was fascinating talking with Mark as we wandered through because he was seeing things in a way I never could. We same across some pits and old wood planks in the amphitheatre floor and I had no idea what they were. Mark immediately figured it out and told me it was probably a sewer system, and he described what he was seeing and why he thought that. A little bit further on, we came across a sign and he was right. This gave me hope in the next few days when we would hit some castles and museums that Mark would be more interested than I had thought and he might be the teacher and me the student.

Day 5 Friday

Last time in London our intent was to go to Windsor Castle, but it was raining and so we made a last-minute decision to go to Hampton Court instead thinking there would be more inside time and less walking in the rain. No regrets with that decision and I thought Mark and Lori would enjoy Hampton as well, but Windsor won out this time since we’d never been either.

I was confused by national Rail’s app on how to buy tickets from Fulham Imperial Wharf to Windsor and so I did it the hard way. We scanned in with our credit cards to take the London Overground to Clapham Junction but then had to walk from the track furthest from the Entry/Exit to scan out and then buy return tickets to Windsor and then use them to scan back in and walk to another of the furthest tracks from the entrance. I’m sure there was a simpler way, but it was lost on me. In any case, we got there and had a good day. I’ll compare Hampton Court and Windsor as I have for Edinburgh and Glashow Castles; both housed royalty but what you see in the interior is completely different. I think Windsor Castle is more visually stunning on the outside, but we enjoyed Hampton Court’s interior more. Not to say we didn’t enjoy it; I just think Hampton was a bit better.

Upon entry we discovered a free tour offered on the half-hour that was happening in 15 minutes and so we took it. What that caused us to miss though-and I still haven’t seen where to pick them up, was the audio guide. Carla says our guide ‘kind of’ pointed out where to get them but said we didn’t have time and we’d have to go back later. I don’t recall ever seeing a sign at the entry gate leading a way to the audio guides. Anyway, the guide left us outside the doors to the dollhouse which was a long way from where the audio guides supposedly were. I wish we’d taken the time to go back; they would have been useful.

The tour was about half an hour long and was enjoyable but not necessary if your time is limited. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but the guide-who had met the Queen on occasions said that as QE2 got older her staff were trying to convince her to wear a helmet while riding her horse. Apparently, the Queen wasn’t shy of bad words to give her opinion on that.

The Dollhouse took me by surprise. I wouldn’t have listed it as a must-see, but it is spectacular. We missed the Christmas decorations by a week and after we got home, we saw photos that showed even the dollhouse has its own mini decorations. That was one of a many things I saw that I thought would not be of interest to me, another was a massive display of royal china that’s been used for state functions over the centuries. My favourite was the china with an Egyptian theme.

We toured the Castle for about 5 hours; I’m surprised that the RS guide suggests giving yourself 2 hours. We would have to be sprinting to have seen it in that. After the castle we wandered around Windsor and Eton for about an hour and headed home. I can see ourselves staying in Windsor for a couple of days in a future trip. For the record I’m going to say that more than once in this TR.

Day 6 Saturday

If we thought the Borough Market was disappointing, the Portobello Market in Notting Hill was doubly so. And not because it was our only rainy day of the trip. I had a friend who used to live in London who raved about the market, but while we aren’t disappointed we went, it’s another one-and-done market and we never have to see it again. Even in the rain it was crowded. Carla is 5’0” and Gladys is 4’11” and 6 days into the trip they’re getting frustrated with crowds. I’m 6’2” and don’t see it from their perspective but London has been crowded wherever we’ve gone and those two were constantly nose to armpit in crowds and it can got claustrophobic for them.

While I love the Tube and how it zips us around the city, it was always extremely crowded as well; especially the Picadilly Line which we took for the 3rd time so far this trip. No matter the time of day, it was wall to wall people. On Tuesday we laughed because we saw a sign at an entry into the Picadilly Circus Station suggesting we may be better off walking if we’re going to the Leicester Square Station because the Picadilly Line is crowded and the walk is only 10 minutes. I guess that sign was foreshadowing of things to come. The next night we took the Picadilly Line to see Moulin Rouge, and it was packed. Then after the show on the way home, authorities were blocking people from entering the station because it was too packed. We ended up walking about 15 minutes to another station to take the District Line towards home.

Back to our day, thankfully the Picadilly Line wasn’t an option as we headed to the British Museum. Sadly, a rainy Saturday is when everyone not at the Portobello Market is at the Museum. Despite Gladys only being 82 going on 72, we’ve been looking for elevators whenever we can to help her out. The British Museum has them, but it was so crowded that it took 15 minutes going up and another 15 going down. Despite that, the museum didn’t disappoint. We tried to start at the Egyptian section, but it was packed with families so we headed to one of my priorities which was the Sutton Hoo exhibit and I thought it was spectacular. Not only to see the original helmet but also the remade replica to show how it may have looked 1400 years ago.

After the Museum we headed to the Covent Garden Market for more Christmas decoration sightings, and it didn’t disappoint. Make sure it’s on your list if you’re going this time of year.

Day 7 Sunday

The Tower of London today. We saw it our last visit but in my mind it’s a must-see when your introducing London to newbies. Like Windsor Castle, the RS guide suggests giving yourself 2 hours which I can’t imagine being anywhere enough time. We arrived for our timed slot at 10:30 and closed the place down at 4:30. When we got there, I was fearful that we had another British Museum type crowd on our hands as we immediately headed for the next Warder tour and discovered it would be us at and about 300 others. No problem I thought, they’ll get another 2 or 3 Warders out to break into smaller groups. Nope, 1 Warder, 300 people. Good thing these guys are loud.

The Crown Jewels area has been completely re-done and it’s kind of a mess. It’s a larger space and now features new stuff and information using the King’s coronation as a backdrop to the history of coronations, and it isn’t until the end that you get to the moving sidewalk to see the crow jewels. The exhibit is interesting, but the directional signage is horrible. You have to follow a one-way path from room to room, but finding the entrances to some of the rooms was confusing. It has spaced out the mobs that gather at the jewels though and gives everyone a bit more breathing room.

Maybe it’s just us that needs more than 2 hours. By about 1:30 the place was emptying out and aside from the main floor of the White Tower, we had the rest of the tower to ourselves. Mark again proved to be a good museum buddy as he was seeing things that were beyond my scope, he’s less interested in the history and more about how and why things are made. Even though he’d never seen a real one before he took a look at a crossbow and was able to give me a lesson on how it was made and how it works. I think he’s got a future calling as a docent.

On Thursday by chance as we were wandering the Southbank we came across an old pub called the Anchor that was all decked out for Christmas. We decided to head there to eat after realizing that it was a short bus ride away after crossing the Tower Bridge. https://www.greeneking.co.uk/pubs/greater-london/anchor-bankside Rebuilt in 1676 after the Great Fire it was a perfect setting to get our fill of English pub charm with small rooms and unexpected staircases, all glowing with Christmas decorations. The food was really good, but I’d recommend it for the charm alone.

Day 8 Monday

Nothing firm planned today and everyone wanted a sleep-in day. For me, that means 6:30, apparently nobody else thinks that’s sleeping in. We’d walked along the river one other time to a nearby restaurant, but it was dark. This time I wandered out on my own while everyone was still asleep and I hadn’t realized what a swanky neighbourhood this is on both sides of the river with modern glass apartment buildings and a nearby corporate helipad. It was busy as a bus stop with helicopters landing and taking off every few minutes. We were staying in a 3-bedroom flat but didn’t think it was anything other than average, but other flats in our building were selling on average for £1.38 million. I can’t imagine what the buildings near the helipad were going for. One interesting note from the Real Estate listing is that they all seem to report what the cellphone coverage is like. We had terrible coverage in our apartment, and I learned that aging and poor infrastructure in London is an issue with cell coverage and it’s something renters aad buyers will pay attention to when they’re looking for a place.

Other than that tidbit of info that may interest nobody but me, it was a slow, dull day. Mark, Lori and Gladys wanted to ride the Eye so we headed there about noon. While they rode, Carla and I wandered about looking for good views from across the river of Big Ben and the Parliament Buildings. If we hadn’t seen a lot of tourists before then, we did now. Mobs of them getting in our way taking selfies and videos….after taking our selfie we headed back to the Eye to meet with the others. For the record, they loved the Eye and thought it very worthwhile. Up to this point I had wondered if the crowds at the Tower, Museum and along the Christmas sites were tourists or locals because I wasn’t seeing a lot of typical tourist behaviours, but this area across the river must be on some popular Instagram pages because this was obviously tourist central.

We didn’t have any direction today because I had been hoping Mark and Lori would give us a list of more things they wanted to see, as a result we didn’t see much. We took the tube to Leadenhall Market because I’d heard it was decked out for Christmas, but it was mid-afternoon and maybe it looks great at night but was nothing special at this time. Carla was insistent that we were going to hit a Gordon Ramsey restaurant while in town and so we headed to his Bread Street restaurant in the City for a late lunch/early dinner. We’ve always had good luck with Ramsey restaurants, and this was no exception. One rule I have is never to look too closely at my credit card bill after the fact because it just makes me miserable. However, Lori used her credit card for this dinner, and she doesn’t have that rule and so she made me miserable. Three of us ordered burgers, and two had sandwiches, plus one drink each and desert. Bill for the 5 of us was £260 plus a 15% tip automatically added, but you convert that to $Canadian and it came to $565.11!! For burgers ad sandwiches. Luckily, we are all in a position to laugh it off and tell a good story when we got home.

We did note though, that everywhere we ate, a 13.5% service charge was added to our bills. The exceptions were the 15% at Ramseys, and The Anchor had a pop-up on the debit machine with a tip option even though it was a pub and we ordered food and drinks from the bar. Is this service charge and tipping new? I don’t recall it before.

Day 9 Tuesday

“Go to Kew Gardens,” the Forum said, “OK,” I said. Good advice, I haven’t been to Kew before but if the gardens in the summer are as spectacular as the lights at Christmas, then Wow. We were going to be in Richmond anyway. In 2018 we brought Gladys to London to meet cousins she’s never met before and we were able to meet with 3 of them. This time around only Cousin Tony was available and since he lives in Richmond, he invited us to meet him at noon for the grand tour. Tony is Gladys’s cousin, but he’s closer in age to Carla and walks and rides a bike everywhere and the grand tour started at the train station, up to King Henry’s Mound in Richmond Park where you can see north into London to St Paul’s Cathedral, a short lunch at the Pembroke Lodge, down toward a park along the river and past Ham House and then back into Richmond for a quick Ted Lasso tour (Tony hasn’t seen it but saw the filming all over the place and so was able to point out filming locations) and a stop for drinks at the pub used in the show. A total of 5 miles of walking so far. https://maps.app.goo.gl/hCPxMUeK5wAH2sKp7

The path through Kew Gardens takes 2 hours. We thought about an hour in that we were almost done, but then we turned a corner and there was more! The lights were spectacular, and Chrismas music throughout the park added to the atmosphere. Well worth the money-£27/pp I think. We stopped for a late meal at The Shaftesbury which was highly recommended by Tony and he was right. It’s one of those Gastropubs that have been mentioned often on this Forum, and no service charge added to the bill, so maybe that’s just a London thing.

We’d been averaging about 17,000 steps per day on the trip, but today we blew by that with 24,000 worthwhile steps. Even Gladys, 82 going on 72 was able to keep up. Richmond may be worthy of a stay on a future trip, and definitely Kew Gardens will be on the list when the flowers are blooming.

Day 10 Wednesday

Well, this day didn’t go as planned. It was our last full day and I had back-to-back London Walks planned. Some were protesting that we walked enough yesterday, so I said I was going by myself if nobody else came. Sadly, the Travel Gods had other plans. As I turned off the water and then turned to open the glass shower door I slipped. Down I went and the door exploded and I landed on piles of safety glass. Lots of glass and lots of blood from mainly superficial wounds from my foot up to my knee and inner thigh and on my arm and back. I wasn’t hurt except for the cuts, and the only traumatic experience was likely Lori who is a nurse and was forced to look at me wearing nothing but a skimpy towel She was able to clean me up and she said I had to go to the hospital so they could make sure there was no glass stuck inside my wounds. There is a taxi stand across the street from apartment and every morning and night when we walked to the nearby train station there was a line of taxis waiting. This morning though….none. We waited for a few minutes before I’d had enough and with blood dripping down my leg we caught the bus. For the record I was wearing pants instead of a towel by this time saving the passengers the same trauma that Lori had felt.

To make a long story short, we were in-and-out of the ER in 3 hours. My foot, knee, inner thigh and elbow were x-rayed to confirm there was no glass stuck in me. I had my insurance and credit card ready in case I needed to pay but was told there is no charge for ER visits and payment would have only started if I had been admitted. I’m feeling lucky that it was me that slipped and not Gladys. She showered our first day and said the shower floor was too slippery and she was sticking to baths the rest of the way. The rest of us were also aware how slippery the showers in the apartment were and were trying to be careful; I just wasn’t careful enough. I had notified the AirBnB host that I was on the way to the hospital and had sent photos of the shower door, and while I was sitting in the waiting room I was sent an estimate for £1344 to repair the door. I may start another post to go through the whole experience to describe the steps when something like this happens. I’m disputing the charge and I’ve been going back and forth with AirBnb’s insurance provider. I’m feeling a bit guilty leaving the host in a difficult place, but accident and injury aside, this has been a frustrating experience.

In any case, my perfectly planned day was ruined, and we never made it to the two walks. Instead, we went out that evening to look at more lights including Harrods (major disappointment compared to Selfridges) and then we walked down to Chelsea to Duke of York Square which was very impressive. I get that all the department stores are decorating in an effort to attract shoppers, but Harrods seemed different, it seemed to put minimal effort into decorating, but maximum effort on separating shoppers from their money.

Day 11 Thursday

The trip wasn’t long enough, but it’s all the time we had. We booked Corporate Black Cabs again to take us back to Heathrow. I was all for taking the Tube and saving some money, but I was outvoted 4-1. Mark especially was adamant that he wanted nothing to do with the train and luggage; especially after I told him that the best route from our location was going to be the Picadilly Line. I can’t complain about the service and recommend Corporate Black Cabs. Our only other experience with Heathrow was in 2014 where we and to change terminals from our flight from Rome to home. We had a 3-hour layover, and we barely made the connection. I can’t remember the terminals, but this time it was terminal 4 and were whipped through security and had 2.5 hours to spare. I may have to stop saying nasty things about Heathrow. However, even if Heathrow had been a mess, London is worth it. I don’t know if we’ve converted Mark and Lori to Europhiles yet, but they did thank us for inviting them and are open to future trips with us. Now the pressure is on, where do we introduce them to next?