London, Teddington - July 26-Aug2
Arrived on time in Luton and had Roger & Allison pick us up as planned and we all met up with the rest of the gang a couple of hours later. John arrived with Don & Maureen, from Scotland so we headed to the bar for a real ale.
The Teddington Club was an excellent choice as it has good facilities, decent food and choice of real ale and is right next to the Thames with lovely walks along the footpaths. Thanks for that Roger.
First night was a walk into Teddington with a so predictable result. A few real ales in an old pub followed by a curry which we over-ordered hugely but still managed to eat enough to leave only a miserly doggie bag for David who joined us for the evening.
Sunday was hot, really hot with 30C so we had a walk to Richmond along the river and had a pub lunch before getting a boat ride back. All very English and so civilized. The crowds were huge at Richmond as it's alongside the river and very beautiful with lots of good pubs and eateries so that's no surprise but there are so many people in London it's scary.
Day 2 saw us getting a train to Waterloo then strolling along the South Bank, locking at all the street artists, jugglers and "statues". There are some very talented performers, everywhere. We then took a Thames Clipper to Greenwich. These are really fast boats that do 30 knots. I asked a crew member the horsepower but all he could quote was speed, the woman attendant told me the colour!! After some Googling I found they were twin 950 HP - very serious horsepower here! For tea, we met up with David in Chinatown and again, overate - what's new?
Wed 30 July
Went to Kew Gardens, what a beautiful place it is. You need days there to fully appreciate the place. Again, we have been blessed by great weather and the shade from the trees was very welcome.
For the evening, we met up with Ros's cousins and partners, the Hyders, in a pub (White Cross - Young's real ale). It was great meeting up again with them all as they are so friendly and welcoming but the evening just flew by