LONDON, THE GROSVENOR HOTEL, AND A SERIAL KILLER
Well once again I have some time to kill in an airport departure lounge, so I thought I would catch you up. In fact this morning I have more time than expected as our WestJet flight from Gatwick to Calgary is delayed for at least an hour and a half (or so we hope). I suppose I shouldn’t complain as it takes as long as it takes to keep these old WestJet planes in a condition that will hopefully keep us in the air longer than the Wright Brothers and home safer than Amelia Earhart.I have been told that there are new WestJet planes on the way in the new year so for those with plans to travel abroad in the future you may be in for a treat. For now we are stacked up like cordwood in the North Terminal adjacent to WHSmith bookstore trying not to be overcome by the stale cigarette stench on the folks sporting the fake tans and bedazzled track suits sitting all about us. And then as if all our prayers were answered the flight for Majorca was called and they all got to their good “foot” & gangster limped away to a gate with the promise of Thomas Cook Holidays in the Spanish Sun (ATOL Protected).
Then it was our turn. Our gate was called and we made our way to 571. Upon arrival at the gate we were lucky enough to witness a WestJet employee domestic dispute as the plane had apparently been ready for some time but there had been no ground staff to board the passengers. So while a grumpy bald WestJetter berated the first young lady in uniform to appear, she returned volley to who I would guess was her supervisor with a “who do you think you are”. That continued downward until cooler heads prevailed and another young lady arrived from her tea break to further assist. So now we endure the apologies on behalf of WestJet for the delays and their efforts to now board the passengers ASAP and in sequence.
This is where it got entertaining as this was actually my first time witnessing six British Adult benefit cheats (Social Assistance Scammers in Canadian) and the child they had clearly borrowed from the local gypsies to make their way to the front of the line when the call went out for travellers with small children. Nan as she was referred to by the middle female teenage cheat appeared to be in her early thirties and must have spawned young Vicki Pollard early in her “formative years”. The four accompanying completely tattooed adult males (at the expense of the British tax payer) followed in behind like lambs to the slaughter or benefit cheats to the kabab shop, take your pick.
Then it was time for a litany of regular guests of Disney’s theme parks who were obvious students of the how to get to the front of the line game. All of whom were clearly willing to try feigning all manner of injuries and every other trick in the book to go next.Now it’s our turn to take our seats in WestJet Plus. We are in the 2nd row and I have the pleasure of sitting within earshot of a woman who requires a lot of help from the flight attendant to fully understand what Prosecco is. When the penny dropped another 30 seconds of thought was required to answer yes please or no thank you. Aaron our flight attendant is a huge man with Michael Jackson’s voice & very small hands. Aaron’s hands look strong enough to choke the next neck of the next passenger with the next stupid question. Aaron looks displeased. I understand that look. It gives me a warm feeling to know that someone may dislike people more than I do.
One of my old buddies says without hesitation that there are 6 Billion people on this planet and he likes 3 of them. I’ll stretch to 20 (but that’s it and you know who you are). We are now up in the air and about 8 and a half hours from Calgary with fingers crossed. Now it’s time to go over the last couple of days in London. We arrived nearly three days ago from Barcelona and I must admit we were shocked to be greeted with the hot and humid 29 degree sunshiny weather. It was a British bank holiday on Monday so everyone was out and about in the royal parks enjoying a wonderful family day or just relaxing with friends.
I hope you are inspired to visit some of the places I have written about over the past few years. And if you have been one of the 18 thousand (Wordpress stats) or so readers that have stopped by since I started, thank you! As the lovely African lady working as a cleaner on our Gatwick Express train said to me a couple of days ago, “life is too short. Go places and do things”. She spent some time at our table telling us how excited she was for her next journey. If my memory serves, she is probably now on her way to Mauritius, a place she has never been before. Safe travels my new friend! Memories made are more important than stuff.
Cheers!
Mark
I BRUSHED MY TEETH WITH BUM RASH CREAM.
It has been nearly 72 hours since I decided that the tube of hydrocortisone in my shaving kit was a travel size tube of Crest toothpaste. I must admit that it took about 6 seconds of vigorous brushing before the shock kicked in.The taste was not as I recalled and the immediate sensation of being sick to my stomach was not as per usual either. I looked down to the bathroom counter and to my horror it all became clear. The label says for external use only, so thats a problem right off the bat.When in Britain one must keep a stiff upper lip and “Never Surrender”. I am just hopeful to have an upper lip when I wake up tomorrow, stiff or otherwise. So as I sit knocking out today’s blog I can say that no matter what I eat or what I drink tastes like hydrocortisone. OK, moving on. Today is Saturday but not just any Saturday in Oxford’s calendar. This afternoon is the annual Boat Race as Oxford Universty rows against Cambridge on the Thames for the 163rd consecutive year. This sporting event is rumoured to bring out sometimes close to a million fans along the banks of London’s famous murky river.
After lunch we decided that we should try to find some of the most quaint villages we could, so we drove on to Chipping Norton. I met a fella on the street there who put us on to (as he described) the most picturesque village of them all. He said you have to go and see Lower Slaughter. Not a better name for a crime novel but as we drove into the tiny village your breath is taken away by the picture postcard setting. I suggest that if you are at all interested please search google images for this village. I do not have the vocabulary to do it justice.After a few more hours in the country we eventually wound our way back to the hotel and the drive was spectacular. We stopped in the hotel bar on the way to our room for a couple of local pints. Job done and to bed for an early morning set aside for souvenir shopping.I could go on and on but I am drawn to the television now. The women’s race is on and Cambridge is several boat lengths ahead. I do not want to miss the rest of the afternoon’s excitement so I bid you farewell. Tomorrow is for home and to reconnect with family.Cheers!Markp.s. Cambridge was victorious in all 4 races this afternoon.
The Last Bus (Actually Hyundai) to Woodstock.
Excitement Turns to Lower Back Pain.
Saturday was supposed to be about making sure we get up by 7, have some breakfast and head south from Skye to make it to Dunfermline by 2. Most reading this blog will not understand my obsession with watching England’s men’s rugby team play but today is supposed to be a chance to end the 6 Nations Tournament on a high with a victory over the Irish.I thought if we get to Dunfermline in good time we could find a great pub there. If all goes well we would find a quiet snug to watch the game. Two reasons that a quiet snug out of the way was in order. The first was I wanted to hear the TV announcers call the game, and second, if any Scotsman noticed I was cheering for England, there may have been an angry scene from Braveheart improvised at our table.The Scots get along with the English in so many ways except Rugby or Soccer or any other sport for that matter. To recap, we had 5 hours to make the journey in the glorious sunshine and then an hour to unwind before kickoff.Well sunshine and beautiful mountian scapes gave way to a significant loss of visibility and blowing snow. Two weeks ago the so named “beast from the east” hit the UK with a bout of bad weather that has not been seen in years. Today and two weeks hence we have plunged back into the belly of that beast. Simply put we could not see a hand in front of our faces and that happened in just a matter of seconds.So driving on already challenging roads went from bad to worse. When you see drivers do stupid things in these conditions your blood pressure spikes and explatiffs may sneak out at speed. As we rounded the next blind corner I see a van full of tourists from Asia that have decided to stop dead in the oncoming lane to scout potential photo opportunities near the adjacent river. If perhaps their choice would have included a safer location or at minimum pulling off the road, I suppose I would have understood. When you park in such a fashion other drivers following behind are provided only one choice, and that is to pull into oncoming traffic to get around.I swerved to miss the 5 Series BMW and luckily no damage was caused. This did however cause my temper to rage a tad. As such I was not paying attention to the pot hole that soon swallowed up our front passenger wheel. That in turn set off the tire pressure alarm almost immediately. So that’s cool. Flat tire in the Scottish Highlands. No cell coverage, no handbook in the glove compartment and only a few of the tools in the boot required for a simple tire change.
Regardless cooler heads prevailed (Deanna) and we got down to the business of jacking up the Focus and putting on the donut. Twenty minutes later and we were on our way with filthy hands and strained lower backs. 50 ain’t easy! Eventually we got phone service and we began the process of enquiring what to do to have the tire and clearly bent rim looked at or the car replaced. As you can imagine the more laborious of options is what they (Enterprise) start with. I was hoping for, “We will bring the car to you in Dunfermline sir and we will swap you.” Instead we got, “You better find a National Tyre outlet Sir and have the damage repaired.”
Things you may have already guessed. Number one, the guys at National Tyre couldn’t be bothered. As timing and luck would have it both were otherwise focussed on their local drug dealer who had recently stopped by to drop off a couple of very small plastic bags. There were two “service specialists” at this location. One couldn’t stop doing whatever he was doing (not working) to focus on us. The second one I have appropriately named Ruprect, was clearly wearing safety glasses to prevent him from plunging his own fork into his bastard eyes. We sat in the car for almost an hour before our inattentive customer service rep even gazed at the wheel and then he decided that a rubber mallet would save the day. Well to my surprise customer service representative number one, who by the way resembled Rent Boy of Train Spotting fame did good. I could almost here him grumble:“Choose a life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television. Choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers... Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit crushing game shows, sticking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away in the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourself, choose your future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that?”― Irvine Welsh, TrainspottingOur damaged wheel and tyre went back on and away we went in under two hours (for a 5 minute job). We left Perth and motored on to Dunfermline to the welcome face of Lizzy at the desk of the Holiday Inn Express. “Thank you for being a Spire Elite Customer Sir!” Thank you Lizzy for having everything ready. We shoved our gear into our room and checked the score. I should have known & I guess I shouldn’t complain as it is St. Paddy’s Day. The Irish faces were smiling. They had beaten the English at their own game on their own field.One thing I know for sure is that when you are depressed, beer is the best remedy. Down the road was the Elizabethan and its draft taps o’plenty. No Irish here but lots of Scotsman drinking lots of Tennants. We decided to join them as we know we can’t beat them. To add to the little mercies came a decision to order the Haggis Balls with whiskey cream sauce.
Nice one!SlàinteMark
Give Way to Oncoming Traffic!
Most will know that the vast majority of European cars are much smaller than the ones driven on the highways and byways of North America. There are several reasons for that of course. Fuel is expensive, so a smaller car burns less. The roads in some places are quite narrow and a small car helps navigate those journeys in a safer manner.
Most of our travels up until yesterday in the highlands and on Skye have been on normal dual carriageways and therefore you could be driving a tank and still have plenty of room to manoeuvre. That abruptly stopped yesterday. Trying to fit our Ford Focus between the gravel shoulders has been akin to watching me trying to fit more than one leg into a pair of 32” waiste jeans.But miracles do happen and so far so good. Being attentive is key to survival. If a semi-truck fully laden with Cod is set for south when you are set for north on a road just a little narrower than the width of a Focus, then terror ensues. When I say terror I mean that phenomenon of fight or flight. That truck (lorry) is coming no matter what. What do you do? The clock is ticking. Do you break with force and reverse with vigor? Do you pull off to the left and hope that the peaty bog does not swallow you up and hold you hostage? Do you play chicken and hope not to become the latest in a plethora of hood ornaments on the massive Volvo truck speeding towards you?
Ten times out of ten I go with slam on the breaks and reverse trying not to deficate whilst screaming in terror. No, those are not tears you see. Tears or a show of emotion would be for big babies not experienced emergency vehicle operators such as myself. Suffice to say the only thing keeping me from my hotel bed and the fetal position is the liquid courage that comes in the form of a smokey golden viscous liquid produced from the purest of waters in the coldest of air.Over the last couple of days we have had the immense pleasure to make stops along our way at two of Scotland’s finest Scotch Distilleries. Yesterday was Dalwhinnie and today on Skye we took in Talisker. Dalwhinnie has the distinct geographic notoriety as Scotland’s highest and coldest distillery. On both accounts it did not disappoint. Several layers of clothing along with woollen accoutrements were required to brave the tour. Regardless of the conditions the tour was wonderful and we both learned a lot about the distilling process.
Deanna is not one who has enjoyed the spoils of a wee dram before, so the tasting experience after the tour was timely and thoroughly enjoyed by both of us. There was absolutely no pressure to buy as we concluded but that did not put us off and a bottle of the 15 year old and two complimentary glasses went into the shopping bag.We continued along the highway to Skye from the Highlands through the Cairngorms National Park. Our next stop was for an obligatory photo op at Eilean Donan Castle. I have seen hundreds of photos of this place in the past and it was just spectacular in person. We spent half hour just gazing across the bridge at its buttresses and ramparts. I am so glad the rain was on a tea break.
We made our way back into town for the COOP and picked up a few things for a picnic dinner in the room. As I sit here rambling I am almost driven to distraction from the winds outside pounding our windows from the west and the Irish Sea.I am sure that you are sick and tired of this nonsense by now so I will provide you with some sorely earned respite from my rubbishy stories. Tomorrow finds us heading southeast to Edinburgh and the hopes that we arrive in time to find a pub that does not hate the English so much that we can watch their team take on Ireland in 6 Nations Rugby action at 2:45 pm.
Live well!