Part 4, Great Britain

Monday, 3 July, 2017 – Weather cool and overcast

Well, with Gusto Gastronomica finished, it is time to fly from France to England. We go up to the 8th floor for one final breakfast. We pack and are ready to go to be picked up by taxi at 7:15. Downstairs, checkout and we are on our way to the airport.

Now I will have to say, except for the punchline at the end, this is one of the better flights. Driver picked us up on time. Drive through traffic, sometimes heavy, but get to airport in good time. There was a queue at bag drop but it moved through smoothly. There was no queue going through security in spite of warnings that there would be. We find a lounge just on the other side and are able to have some drinks etc. We exit immigration through no queue – we have had some horror waits at Lyon airport in the past. Board in good time, we are nearer the front and manage to get overhead storage which can be, and was for others, a serious issue. We are in Economy (yuk) but the people in the row in front of us did not push their seats back so there was a reasonable amount of room. Flight went smoothly and at the end, only a 10 minute place in a holding pattern which is not bad for Heathrow. All of this is acceptable.

What did go wrong? We take the long walk from the gate to immigration. As we enter the room, we see squillions of people waiting in long and many serpentine queues to get through. Just what I need is to stand in a slow moving queue for 2 hours and that is what it took. Horrible! I have vowed never to fly into Heathrow again.

Finally through that horror story and not surprisingly our bags were off the plane and then carousel ages ago. My back and legs are stiff as boards after all the shuffling in the queue. We take the relatively long hike to the bus terminus as we are bussing up to Oxford. After we get there, our bus shows up shortly. There is a fair bit of poobah as the passengers unload and get their baggage, the bus is cleaned out, baggage loaded into the bus hold and finally we are let onto the bus. The weather by the way, is cool, cloudy and drizzly. We stop at Terminal 5 to pick up more passengers and then at several stops along the way. When we reach Oxford we drive around in circles, it seems, and eventually reach the bus terminus. We get off and go to a nearby square where taxis can be hailed. There are fast food shops around the square. I am tired, thirsty, sore and hungry so decide to grab something to eat.

We catch a hansom cab to Keble College which is where we will be staying for the next six nights while Julie studies. We check in and are lead to our room:

At this point I should say something about the Internet, or lack thereof. There is a global “Cloud” which is supposed to work. It does on the phone but not the PC and no one can explain why. I get it working with a trick but over the 6 nights here, it varies from bad to worse to not at all to virus like symptoms. This is the reason for delays on this Blog update.

Julie goes off to do some study. I have a brief nap and then go out for a walk around.

Keble College is like a number of old Colleges at Universities around Britain. It has very old buildings, circa 1850s, huge grounds and the buildings within the grounds are also very big.

All of that large area in the photos is just over a quarter of the grounds and buildings of Keble College. Another College nearby is as big or bigger.

I have agreed to meet Julie at a pub just down the road, the Kings Arms. It is about a 10 minute walk but I am so stiff and sore and frozen from that immigration wait that it is hard work. I arrive early and have just ordered a drink when Julie arrives. It is crowded but we get a seat in the bar area. I am not hungry at all, and Julie has had a snack in the afternoon, so we do not contemplate a meal.

We go back to the room. Julie had asked the front desk for the piano to be removed which they said they would do. Come 10:00 PM, still no removal so Julie goes to the front desk and brings back the guy on duty. With great difficulty, as the piano is very heavy, they push it out of the room and into the unused room next to ours. It becomes the housekeeper’s problem now.

Off to bed after a long and tiring day.