Tea Pun For London

I arrived in London yesterday morning (June 18th) much too exhausted/excited to submit a new blog entry, so I'll recap on the first day's events before talking about today's in a different post...

We arrived early and quickly made our way through the labyrinth that was Heathrow airport and made it onto the Picadilly line of the Tube. The journey had gone pretty smoothly up to then and I was feeling pretty good despite having gotten little to no sleep in the past 12 or so hours. However, my suitcase betrayed me, and not once, but twice.

First was when the Tube began moving, and, as a slip in awareness on my part, I neglected to have a hand on my blue behemoth of a suitcase. As a direct result, it went skittering down the length of the car despite my attempts to catch it--right into some poor man's legs! That thing was 50 pounds, so I was impressed he seemed less upset (and damaged) as I apologized profusely and retrieved my traitorous bag. I must also admit that I was relieved to discover that he was not a Londoner--at least going by his American accent. That would have been a terrible first interaction with the locals.

But, my luggage was not through torturing me yet. As we tried to get off at Gloucester Road station, only two of us made it off before the Tube's door closed to leave part of our group stranded. Make that two people plus my suitcase.

The rest of us got off at South Kensington and managed to make it to Metrogate to fetch the keys for our residence as we hoped to meet the lost duo there. They made it, and so did my bag despite its best attempts to escape my grasp and taint the trip.

The rest of the day was wonderfully long as we teetered on the brink of unconsciousness while grocery shopping and exploring a bit of the borough. A few of us also managed to take a leisurely stroll in Hyde Park just next door, before wrapping up the day with a walking tour and then visiting "The Gloucester Arms" (a local pub). Not a bad way to end a first taste of London!