I’m off to the U.K. to finally take a trip that I had booked almost exactly a year ago but had to postpone because of my hip issue. On my bucket list of places to see in this world has for a long time been the Channel Islands. There’s 5 of them: Guernsey, Jersey, Alderney, Herm and Sark and they are British even though they’re pretty much just off the coast of France in the English Channel. I’m not sure why I’ve wanted to see them, maybe after reading the novel: The Guerney Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society book a few years ago? Or after seeing some documentaries on how they were the only part of Britain occupied by the Germans during the war? Or maybe most recently because of the Durrell mini-series…? Anyway, who knows but I had reservations made 14 months ago and now I’m off to keep them!

I flew into Heathrow today and jumped on the Picadilly tube to Earl’s Court where I’d booked a small room at the Jade Hotel. And small isn’t an understatement – it is only a single bed-plus-a 2′ wide desk-as-a-night-table-wide room but it has the cutest little kitchenette at foot of bed with a dorm-sized fridge just perfect for wine & cheese; and if I swing the TV out of the way, a microwave hiding in an upper cabinet and a tiny bar sink.  Dinners are sorted! That’s perfect for me, dinners in bed watching British telly!

I took a bus down to Hyde Park for a leisurely stroll to hopefully erase some of the jetlag cobwebs, then boarded the Megabus for a 2-hour, £1(!!) narrated tour of London.  The commentary was pre-recorded and somehow tied in with GPS to start describing once we arrived/passed each location – how else to account for any traffic delays?  Weather was perfect, traffic not horrendous, and the upper floor of the double-decker bus gave me a great overview of the city. We drove by every single tourist attraction in London (50) and got a tiny bit of info on each. Now that’s a pound well spent!

I don’t have a single photo of today. Not sure what happened there but my iPhone obviously had a glitch. 😦