Hello from London.

I have NO idea if anyone is reading this, but I need to document what we’ve done because I’m already starting to forget!

The flight here was uneventful, but delayed for an hour leaving Edmonton.  No big deal, we just got here an hour later.

July 1: After arriving around noon, we got to the hotel with no problem.  In fact, it was an entirely smooth transfer from Heathrow to Paddington, to the hotel.  We took a little breather, then went for a walk in Hyde park, which is quite nearby.  A beautiful afternoon, and, if anything a little hot.  We had a reasonable non-descript dinner at “Dickens Pub” and went to bed around 8 o’cock to try and catch up on the Jet lag.

July 2: Up for breakfast at 8:00, and off on a city, hop-on-hop-off tour bus.  We stopped at Westminster Abbey, but it was closed for the day (A private NHC function was going on), so we continued to London Tower.  I think we all enjoyed that, but it took a little too long and we never made it back to St. Paul’s (it closes at 4:30) as was in the plans.  We headed down to the Victoria area to see the musical “Wicked”.  Very enjoyable, but we couldn’t find anything to eat before the show.  And after, nothing was open (or allowing children in), so we ate at McDonalds (Honestlt, the ONLY thing we could find!!)  By the time we got back to the hotel, it was close to midnight.  Quinn immediately came down stairs with his hands and legs covered in bug bites.  We tried to figure out what happened, and suspected bed bugs, but what can you do at midnight, and maybe he sat on an ant hill on the grass or something?  He slept on a clean douvet cover on TOP of his bed that night, just in case.

July 3: In the morning, no new bites, but we took Quinn to a doctor at Victoria Station, and yes, it was BED BUGS!  His hands and feet look like they’ve each got 100 mosquito bites!  Horrible.  He’s been very good about it, but just wishes it would just go away.  He’s quite itchy, but Benedril keeps it from being too bad.  We’ve contacted the hotel and they’ve (apparently — we haven’t been back yet) looked after it.  For the rest of the day, we hit Westminster Abbey, and then St. Paul’s — where we ALL made it to the very top of the high dome.  Very impressive for those of us who genuinely had trouble getting up there — fear-wise.  Following that, we’ve just had a 2 hour “Jack the Ripper” tour through Whitechapel and are now on our way back to the hotel for the night.  I’m SO tired!  And it’s our ANNIVERSARY!

Tomorrow, we’re off to Stonehenge and Avebury on a tour, so it’ll be a big day, but it’s a WHOLE day, and we aren’t walking nearly as much as we have, so it should be a little more restful…I hope!

Until tomorrow, Ian out!