Day Trip to London

England house-hunting trip continued (June 15-22):

After we had decided on our housing and had looked at cars we might buy, we found ourselves with some down time and decided a day trip to London was in order. We were able to walk to the train station in Peterborough from our hotel and purchased off-peak return train tickets on the express train (direct from P'borough to London). The train was fast - only took 45 minutes to get into Kings Cross Station in London and our tickets included all-day tube passes (subway). Our first stop was at the BYU London Centre in Notting Hill where I lived 8+ years ago. They let us in and I got to tour Matt around a bit. Then we headed riverside - over to Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, the London Eye (giant ferris wheel), and spent a few hours inside Westminster Abbey. We grabbed lunch at a little fish 'n' chips place and then continued our adventures at Tower Bridge, the Tower of London, St. Paul's Cathedral and the British Museum.

Without kids in tow we were able to cover a lot of ground and at least get a sampling of all the exciting destinations that London has to offer. We also mapped out WC locations (since public toilets are hard to come by and often cost the equivalent of 50 cents to use) and found a few parks and playgrounds that the children would enjoy for our next trip to London - since they will likely come along on future trips.

Our train tickets were for off-peak hours, meaning we had to travel after 10 am to London and after 7 pm home to P'borough, which was fine because we were so busy seeing things all day. We caught the 10:30 PM train home and it was a comfortable and quick trip back to Peterborough. We look forward to trying it again in the near future!