Back from London!
As promised I am starting my travelogue about my most recent
trip. Yesterday my husband and I
returned from London, UK where we went for ‘spring break’.
We had stayed in
Paddington, an area that is very central, in west London. It is not purely by
chance that I like to stay in Paddington, it happens to be the area I grew up
in until I went to high school. So I have family there including an elderly,
mentally ill aunt whose situation I tried to impact while I was there.
One of my cousins had driven down from Southport (4 hours
away) to pick us up at the airport and spend the day. We were intrigued by his
self driving car. After a stop in north London to see my mother, we dropped the
huge suitcase of clothes I had brought for my aunt at her apartment. She stays
in a building for the elderly and it was fascinating to see the difference in
how the ‘welfare state’ in England works compared to the US. Unlike here, the term welfare does not have a
negative connotation to the man on the street.
We stayed at the Park Grand Paddington Hotel, my goodness, despite its grand title and 4 star rating it was the smallest hotel room I have
ever seen (even in Paris, which is notorious for small spaces). We had to
literally crawl across the bed to open the curtains in the morning. The best
thing about this hotel however (besides being a 10 minute walk to Paddington
station) is the free cell phone that comes with the room. You can call anywhere
in the world for free and it works throughout England. It was great for getting
directions, google-ing and keeping up with my family.
One thing about most neighborhoods in central London,
physically, they don’t seem to change except for the new freeways. Many
neighborhoods look exactly the same as they did 50+ years ago. I took a picture
in front of my childhood home, its hard to imagine that the top flat where we
had stayed just sold for 300,000 pounds and the bottom for almost a million.
Outside, except for the dark unpainted door that I used to hate, it doesn’t
look that different. The pavement appears to be the same original stones that
were there when I was a child.
After two days of family issues our ‘vacation’ began, my
poor husband was starting to look exhausted as we started our planned day trip
to Oxford. We left from Paddington station and the trip took exactly 1 hour and
5 minutes. If you travel outside of rush hour (after 9AM) the prices are very
reasonable. The ticket was about $30 round trip. After the obligatory visit to
two world famous bookstores (my husband is a professor) we walked around the
town and in and out of the college campus. A very pretty and historical town,
the weather was great, which in England means it did not rain. I stuffed my
face with an English scone with all the toppings, clotted cream, jam and
butter. Not very healthy but it had to be done J.
FYI, if you go to Oxford you can skip the trip up the tower,
not much to see. But definitely go to the natural history museum especially if you
are with kids: everything is very hands on and they have life-like animals from
all over the world along with dinosaur bones and other fascinating articles in
an amazing building. We were able to tour the town, take in the atmosphere,
buy books and return by 4pm. Great day.
Other highlights of the trip were a luncheon cruise down the
river Thames with my cousins and a trip to Covent garden to see the Carole King
musical ‘Beautiful’. It’s a cheerful sing-along kind of show, very
entertaining. It happened to coincide with St Patrick’s Day fortunately we
managed to get out of there before too many revelers got sloshed (drunk).
London is an incredibly vibrant city but it is by no means
the only place one should visit in the UK.
The truth be told it would probably take a year or more to really see
all the sights.
I was happy to discover that one side benefit of travelling
is a refreshing break from ‘breaking news’!
Our trip was short and sweet and the flight in and out was very efficient, landing ahead of time. FYI, if you are going to fly out of
Dulles save yourself the hassle and park at the Crowne Plaza hotel their
shuttle is free and very efficient.
I started to read 'the happiness project' on the way back. I
didn’t get through too much of it but I share some of the insights from it that are particularly
good for health in my next blog.
Last but not least, keep moving whether you are here or abroad.
Cheers!
Dr. Tuakli
