Tuesday, October 2, 2012

London! (The itinerary!)

We're going to London later this month! I'm so excited!

Air New Zealand had some amazing round trip fares for direct flights out of Los Angeles to London, so we jumped on the opportunity to visit two friends that are living there. It's been over a year since I've seen SD, and it's been over FIVE years since I've seen CH! I've never flown Air New Zealand before, but so far it's been a great experience with them - they have a really, truly fantastic customer service line, are friendly and never rude, and gave us free London Passes with the purchase of our tickets! The London Pass is going to come in handy, too, with line jumping and free entry to a ton of attractions. 

So, what do we plan on doing? 

Nothing, and everything.

I want at least 1 day of this trip to be dedicated to not having any plans. In the other two trips I've taken this year - New York and the Wild Wild (Mid)West, our days were packed to the gills with stuff to do. Must see this, must do that, must eat here. So this trip? Not a whole lot of that. I want some quality time with BF. I want some really fun, casual times with our friends. And I want to actually be able to soak in a true idea of what London is like!

There are, of course, things I want to see - Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, the London Eye, the London Tower and Tower Bridge, St. Paul's Cathedral, Harrods, the rugby museum, the bridges. Maybe Windsor Castle. Maybe the Chislehurst Caves. A coworker told me that the Soane Museum can't be missed. There's a DaVinci Code tour that looks my inner nerd thinks sounds awesome.  And there are bike tours and boat tours and canal tours and seven new attractions... the list goes on and on. 

On the top of my "musts" list - afternoon tea! I love, love, love tea, and I feel like it's a quintessential thing to do while visiting London. Not sure where we'll end up, but I'll be sure to post about that later! 

And someone on a TripAdvisor recommended this "marvelously cheap" outing for visitors: "Take the Docklands Light Railway from Bank station in the direction of Lewisham. Get off at Island Gardens and walk through the historic pedestrian tunnel under the Thames. Pop out in Greenwich and stroll around - perhaps eating a picnic in the park or going to the Maritime Museum (free)." It sounds good to me! 

All I want out of this trip is great escape - good, relaxing time with BF and my friends, and to feel completely NOT stressed when we get home. And I think we've got a pretty good plan (or, non plan?) to make that happen!

So, have any of you been to London? Is there anything out there that we shouldn't miss?