London Calling

After a seamless and luxurious flight on Virgin Atlantic, we arrived in foggy London town last Monday afternoon (9/5) and headed directly to our hotel which was conveniently located between Hyde Park and Notting Hill. It was a beautiful hotel and from there we walked the entire city. Some of the main attractions were walking through Hyde Park, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, eating amazing French onion soup and having champagne. For dinner we met our friend, Dan, at an incredible restaurant where I ate the most incredible duck I've ever had. We ended the night having a beer with Dan and his colleague. One of my favorite drinks is Guinness mixed with cider beer and evidently that didn't go over so well with the locales. I digress. It was a wonderful first day/night.

The next day we suffered some MAJOR jet lag and slept until 3pm! We still managed to get in a ton of walking and sight seeing including walking the city: National Gallery, SoHo, Houses of Parliament, Picadilly Circus and had Indian food for dinner in our cute neighborhood. 

Day 3 we woke up at 4am and continued our tour - we went inside Westminster Abbey (Charles Darwin, William Blake and some others are buried there), Buckingham Palace, ate fish & chips, etc.

That night we ate dinner at a fabulous Persian restaurant in Notting Hill and called it a night early. We left London on Thurs morning...to be continued. 

We loved London, particularly the architecture, friendly Britts and the great (non-Brittish) cuisine. Despite being extremely expensive, London was the perfect way to kick-off our travels and ease into the European way of life. 

I'll send pics via Picassa, but here's a few in the meantime...