The sun was shining when we pulled back
the curtains. I had woken a little early
but nicely refreshed. We found a nice café
in which to have breakfast and then took the train to Gloucester Road Station
and walked to Kensington Gardens to begin a walk through Hyde Park.
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| Kensington Palace |
As we entered Kensington Gardens Bev spied
some bikes called “Santander” which are metro bikes for hire. The idea is to pay a small fee which gives
you an unlock code. You ride your bike
to your destination, find another stand to
leave your bike at and the bike locks back into it. We discovered the cost was only £2 for the
day and you can drop and pick-up a bike as many times as you like within a 2 hour
period. On the spot we decided to do it. It was a great way to get around
the gardens and the park and lots of fun, although compared to our bikes back
home they were very simple and much heavier with only three gears.
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| By the Serpentine, Hyde Park |
We returned our bikes after about an hour
of cycling at stand near Oxford Street. I used the opportunity to look for some walking shoes at Ecco
to replace my rapidly wearing walking shoes.
I found some that I liked but will wear mine into the ground before spending
the dollars. The store
had a great range (the Ecco store in Wellington has a much more restricted range) even if the service was a bit random. Bev and I then split, with me looking at
potential DVDs to buy and Bev looking for some clothes. We finally met up again a bit further up the
road and went for a bite to eat in a place called Sacred off Carnaby Street
that is or was owned by New Zealanders.
The coffee was good there but still not as good as our Wellington
brews.
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| Returning the bike |
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| Carnaby Street |
Bev wanted to do some more bike riding (I
was keen too) which then prompted a memory of a ride that I had read about in a
paper or magazine that went along the Grand Union Canal and Regents Canal. So we headed to Paddington where we got
another bike from Santander. We then
followed the cycle trail to Paddington Basin where there was a festival of
narrow boats going on much to our surprise. It was really
buzzy with boats lashed to each other, bunting and a whole lot of stalls lining
the paths along the canal. It took us
some time to get through the crowds and stalls that went from the Basin all the
way past a place called Little Venice (where I discovered later that Regents Canal joins the Grand Union Canal). Our friend Lew would have been in seventh heaven!
Finally the crowds cleared and we were able
cycle a bit more freely although much slower than we have been used to. We went along a canal which turned out to be
the Grand Union for about six and a half kilometres. We turned around when it seemed all we were
heading into was industrial land and was nothing like I had read about. When we got back to Little Venice (to a jazz
band playing New Orleans jazz and with an average age of 70) I realised I had
missed the turn to Regents Canal due to the congestion of boats, stalls and
people.
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| Narrowboats rafted together in Paddington Basin |
If we had not had a train to catch to
Gatwick I would have liked to have stayed and had a drink listening to the
music and watching the people.
After picking up our bags from our hotel we
trundled our way back to Earls Court Station.
I had noticed that on the District and Circle lines, both routes went
through Victoria Station. Unfortunately
the train we hopped on was going on another route to West Kensington. To rectify this we had to get off the train
and onto another which fortuitously was going to Victoria Station.
I had topped up our Oyster Cards so we
could use them to buy our tickets to Gatwick. What I did not
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| The crowds |
realise was that
we could have just tapped on at the gate and got our tickets but no I bought
some tickets at a machine which did not have an Oyster reader. This was the second of a number of
errors I made getting to our accommodation near Gatwick Airport. The train took us to the South Terminal from where we made our way to our bus stop. I
had read that we had to take the get off at a particular bus stop and then walk five
minutes to the hotel. We got off at the designated
stop and I thought we had walked in the right direction but it turned out I had
blown it completely. It resulted in us
walking something like five kilometres in a circle and using Google Maps to
finally find it. Bev was none too
pleased with me. As an appeasement I
took to dragging both bags. The only
positive out of that experience will be well developed shoulder muscles.
It was a relief to finally get there as
night fell upon us. We were informed by
the receptionist however, after we had checked-in, that the restaurant in the
pub next door was not taking any further orders until 9:30pm. We decided that we would still eat even at
that time (I was starving) and enjoyed a drink while we waited. Fortunately the pub food was very good
and worth waiting for.
It was a very enjoyable and active day
despite my little setbacks.
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| Artwork near Little Venice - Grand Union Canal |
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| Tow path - now with people and bikes |
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| Jazz men entertaing the crowds |
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