eurostar to london

there’s been a lot of snow – much more than is normal and much of france has been stopped up because of it. since we don’t drive around and everything is within walking distance, we just haven’t been affected. as we approached the holidays though, there were all kinds of predictions of terrible weather to come. we heard that the eurostar to london had terrible delays. we were scheduled to take the eurostar to london on wed the 22nd and braced for delays. we lucked out again. by the time our day came, things were almost back to normal and our train was only an hour late all together. we laughed though, because we were sitting waiting to board. we were told that the 1:00 train would be late and board at 1:20 to leave at 1:35. at 1:10 there was an announcement, “eurostar is boarding NOW”. we barely got down to the platform from the waiting room, when another announcement said “the eurostar is closing its doors” and a whistle blew. EEEK! everyone hustled to get themselves aboard. we got to our seats and the train started moving. it was 1:15. it turned out that there were lots of empty seats – i said that it was the seats of all the people left back at the platform! if anyone had gone off to the bathroom they would’ve been left behind! it was a relatively quick trip. it really is amazing how fast we can get to london. it was noticeably uglier in london. the areas outside of london were grey and sad looking – piles of dirt in empty spaces. very grey and industrial looking. i had found a very reasonably priced hotel near “queensbury” and “bayswater” tube stop – called “the london house hotel”. we got a triple for L85 for the night. the hotel was very clean and modern. it was a good find. after checking in, we went out to a bookstore, and then to get dinner at a pub. the prices seemed more reasonable than i had remembered. perhaps we are getting used to the european prices. afterwards we went to get dessert. we wandered into a nearby mall and found a great gelato place. london has an amazingly diverse population. it seemed that we hardly saw any “traditional” english people. we barely heard any english spoken. the pub was quite mixed, but the mall seemed to be mostly people who wouldn’t be hanging out in the pub drinking, because of their religion.

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