Channel hoppers

Last weekend we took our very first visit to London! We were excited to get away for the weekend, especially to somewhere they speak English! We flew Ryan Air for the first time, which is one of Europe's low-cost airlines. Not a bad way to travel for three of us, definitely saved us about $200 on tickets. We headed out early Friday morning to drop off Oscar at the farm and head to Frankfurt Hahn. We arrived, in the rain, and found parking after about 20 minutes. 20 euro for the whole weekend? Yes please! Only because the 10 euro lot was full. We headed in, checked my bag (hey, it was for me AND Hayden, I couldn't carry on), checked our passports and got through security seamlessly. An hour-ish wait and we were on the plane!

Hayden was a lap child for this flight, and did very well in his special seatbelt attached to daddy's. One quick hour and we were landing in London. Most excitingly, they still stamp passports in the UK so Jay got his first stamp (!) and Hayden and I got one as well.  We figured out the train pretty quickly and took the 40 minute ride to London proper at the advice of some friends that had flown into London Stansted before. Thanks Jaime! Once at Liverpool Street station, finding our hotel was a bit tricky but as usual we prevailed. By 4pm we were checked into our hotel and unpacking. Well, two of us were; one of us was jumping on the bed. Three guesses.

After our long day of travel, we decided against much sightseeing and opted instead for dinner across the street at a cute little pub. I had fish & chips, Jay had chicken and a Guinness and Hayden had a blast! We got in bed early and woke up early to our little alarm clock (Hayden) at 5am. Breakfast was a wonderful event in the hotel and Hayden enjoyed baked beans with his breakfast. Silly Brits. We took the Overground to the Underground to get our train tickets and soon were on our way to Salisbury in southern England.  While waiting for our train, we did get our first glimpses at the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, the Thames river and the London Eye. The weather in London was gloomy and wet but we were pleasantly surprised by the sunshine in Salisbury.

Our first stop was the bus stop, literally, to Stonehenge! We rode through the town of Salisbury on a bus with commentary to fill us in on the history. We were dropped off at Stonehenge and fast-tracked through the line to get in. What a magnificent place to visit! Hard to imagine that these stones have been around for thousands of years and are still in pretty good condition. Hayden enjoyed a little run through the grass and took our audio guides to talk on the "whoa" or the phone. After taking as many pictures as possible we headed back to the bus and went to Salisbury.

Salisbury is home to a 13th century cathedral and also the best of the four surviving copies of the Magna Carta. We weren't allowed to photograph it, but it was amazing to see. The cathedral has the tallest spire in England, and the spire itself is actually leaning 29 inches to the west! No worries, it doesn't look like it will fall any time soon. It was beautiful inside and out, and the grounds were full of people just enjoying the August sunshine.

We awoke early Sunday to take our trek around the city. By then, we were pretty good at the Underground even with its construction and re-routes. We headed to the Big Bus to take the tour, and Hayden fell asleep in about 20 minutes. We toured London and Westminster with another set of audio guides, and got to see most of the big sites. We stopped off at Buckingham Palace to see the famous guards, but missed the changing of the guard as it only happens every other day from spring to fall. We went to the Hard Rock for lunch, and headed to the Tower of London. There we saw the 1000-year-old White Tower as well as the rest of the fortress. We also got to see the Crown Jewels of the royal family and boy was I disappointed that this was another photography-prohibited site. They were amazing! Glittery and sparkly and gold and jeweled...my kind of place!

After the Tower we headed down to the pier to take a cruise down the Thames River. We saw some great views of Tower Bridge, the London Eye, Shakespeare's Globe Theater and much more. We were heading to see Westminster Abbey when Hayden got a little sick, so we decided to end our tour for the day and head back to the hotel room.

For our last morning, we got up and packed and ate breakfast and headed to the nearby Abbey Road, made famous by the Beatles. I walked across the intersection along with the rest of the tourists, and that made our trip complete. Soon we were making the return journey back to the hotel, the train station, the airport, the parking lot and finally, home! We had an amazing weekend and I wish we had enough time left in Europe to go back!