Dear Travel Agents,
When people ask for a window seat on aeroplanes, it's because they want a view of the ground, NOT THE FRICKEN WING!!!!
Not happy.
So anyway.
Up at stoopid o'clock (4:40am, although I'd been awake since 4:00). Breakfast, checkout, and off to the airport.
Sunrise over Cairo from my hotel room
The other couples all went their separate ways, although did run into a couple of them in my wanderings. Made use of Cairo airport's free wifi (thanks Cairo!).
And then off we went. I was depressed about my seat, so put on some movies. The EgyptAir 777's entertainment systems are pretty good. Nice touch screen, and several options for the GPS maps. Even between-seat dialling (which I didn't use because I didn't know anyone on the plane heh).
My view - of the wing! Never trust seat allocations to travel agents
Cairo Airport from the plane
I watched Midnight in Paris first up. Knew absolutely nothing about it, so quite enjoyed it, even if it was all a bit silly and extreme coincidences.
Then watched Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, which I also really enjoyed seeing a second time. Still a few things about the movie I disagree with (having just reread the book didn't help).
The alps looked stunning. Have I mentioned how much wing seats suck?
Swiss Alps from the plane
What a lovely view of the wing
Our approach to London was "interesting". I swear air traffic controllers are just playing Flight Control on their phones, and our planes follow their paths..
View towards western London from the plane
Flight track
River Thames at East Twickenham
Air traffic control tower at Heathrow Airport
So after reading an article DC sent me about the queues at Heathrow, I was fully expecting to have to wait hours to get through immigration. But when I walked into the hall it was practically deserted! Win! So getting through the airport was a breeze. Changed my leftover shekels into pounds (noone in Egypt would do it), although could probably have gotten a better deal in a bank. Then did the long walk to the tube station.
Got to my hotel and checked in. Perfectly adequate hotel, although no safe, and breakfast doesn't start til 7am, 8am on Sundays. And a little too warm. But I have a lovely view of the gardens opposite, and it has free wifi!! Seriously why can't fancy hotels do this??
Pretty much headed straight out again to go pickup my London Pass before the office closed. That was in Leicester Square, so wandered up to Piccadilly Circus, which we'd somehow missed out on doing last time.
Piccadilly Circus
Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain
British flags on Coventry Street
Swiss Glockenspiel
Church of St Martin-in-the-Fields
Then down to Trafalgar Square (Nelson's column was in sunlight!!).
King George V statue and Nelson's Column
Nelson's Column
Nelson's Column
Nelson's Column
Past the visitor's entrance to the Ministry of Magic (they were doing construction work last time we were here).
Visitors Entrance to the Ministry of Magic
Visitors Entrance to the Ministry of Magic
A quick look at the Household Cavalry museum from the courtyard, that we'd also missed seeing last time.
Horse Guards Parade
Clock tower on Household Cavalry Museum
A walkby 10 Downing Street, because last time for some reason I thought the Prime Minister's house was on the other side of the road.
10 Downing Street
Tower of Big Ben
Clockface on the tower of Big Ben
And ended up at Westminster station, where I think I found the escalator used in Order of the Phoenix (there's a *lot* of escalators at Westminster station!) as well as taking another pic of the entrance gates used in the movie.
Ticket barricade used in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Escalators in Westminster station (I think these were used in Order of the Phoenix)
I really only came back early because I didn't know what time the laundromat closed. Otherwise I would have kept wandering! It was so much fun with such nice weather and lots of people about being Friday night.
So grabbed my washing and loaded it up. Only twenty minutes for a cycle which is pretty good. So I wandered up and down Earl's Court Road looking for somewhere to have dinner. Did the drying, and went to a Chinese place. Had something I haven't had in a month - pork!! It was pretty good, but too much meat and not enough veggies. My bowels *won't* thank me for that!
Then back here to blog and do photos.
Distance covered on the GPS: 3712.5 km
Steps walked: 15005
Photos on the Canon: 19
Photos on the Sony: 163
Videos: 2
EGP Spent: 10
GBP Spent: 18.40
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