Visit to London…

It was May 31st, 2014 when I arrived in London. The bus from Amsterdam dropped us off at a non-descript bus station in what seemed like the middle of town. It was 6:30 AM and I was a little rummy from lack of sleep. As I headed off with my luggage, I asked a couple guys I’d talked to during the bus ride if they knew where I needed to go to find my hostel. With the new directions in hand, and discovering that the hostel was fairly close, I invited one of the guys for some coffee so I could pick his brain about London since he lived here and all. He didn’t have much money left after his trip on the continent and appreciated the breakfast I paid for while I appreciated the info he gave me about London. And then he says, “I’ve got some time, would you like to walk over to Buckingham Palace after breakfast?” Hah! Now that’s handy. Sure, let’s do it. So off we went to BP. This early in the morning, traffic is light, not many tourists around, and I was totally unaware that we only needed to walk maybe 5-6 blocks.  See that flag? It means that the Queen IS in residence in the palace.

I asked him where the doorbell is, because I wanted to say Hi to the queen, and share some crumpets and tea. And invite her to take over the colonies again since our congress didn’t seem to have any idea how to govern anymore. We couldn’t find a single doorbell. Damn.

I got lucky and arrived between cold and cloudy weather fronts, typical of London this time of year, but even with the sparkling weather, there was always a chance of showers. It was a pleasant, crisp spring day with a few scattered clouds, and pure blue skies as you can see. My bus friend apparently enjoyed showing me around and explaining stuff so I got a nice tour from a local without having to dodge hordes of sightseers.

And I got to be in one of my pictures for a change. I’m still dragging my luggage around, which was getting tiring. But note that I didn’t need a jacket. But, I was needing a nap after all this early morning hiking and the long bus ride so my friend and I parted ways and he headed off to his mum and da’s home, while I headed off to find my hostel. This quaint neighborhood caught my eye on the trip to a nearby tube station. I thought it seemed typically British.

I had pretty good directions and the hostel wasn’t that far so it didn’t take long to find. A 3-4 mile long tube ride to Kings Cross, then a bus ride and I was soon checked in, unpacked, and napping. The neighborhood wasn’t as pleasant or quaint as pictured above, but it was OK, what with the nice bar across the street.

Here is a street view of the front of the hostel: Clink Hostel, Kings Cross, London.

The place is housed in a 200-year-old courthouse, and is 9 minutes’ walk from King’s Cross and St. Pancras train and tube stations. Though most every time I needed to go somewhere, I’d just catch the bus right out front, go to King’s Cross, then take the tube wherever I wanted to go. The Clink  wasn’t my first choice mind you, I actually tried to find a hostel more to my liking but remember, I’m traveling by the seat of my pants, and since I wasn’t able to stay in Amsterdam for 4-5 days like I wanted, that meant I needed a place to stay quickly so this was it. When I’d checked hostels in London yesterday afternoon, it was like Amsterdam, many of the hostels were booked. This one wasn’t. I seem to remember my bed being no more than 27€, perhaps even 24€ per night. I was not very happy with my room though. They had bunk beds, two sets, that were too large and stuffed into a too small room. The shower door leaked badly so there was a huge puddle in the bathroom most all the time. I was the only guest in the room (had four beds) the first night so I was OK, but then the next 3 nights there were other people stuffed in my room. Gah. One night there were two Islamic guys who had thrown towels on the floor and when I walked in they were doing the prayer bit but since I have no respect for religion I just squeezed by them and jumped in my berth. But it’s my own fault because I didn’t try to find better accommodations elsewhere. I did get a view of several other rooms in the building and they were pretty much the same as mine. Too crowded. First time I was disappointed with a hostel I stay at. But I couldn’t complain too much as I said, most of the other hostels were booked. And I’d gotten here on a Saturday.

I’d been traveling for a month and a half by this time and there were some things I needed to take care of. My laundry, get a haircut, and try to find a new power supply for my tablet. My original had a broken lead and the substitute I brought with me was weak and wouldn’t charge fast enough.

But this first day here in London, I wandered across the street on over to the Carpenters bar which was pretty unique and has been here since London expanded this direction in the 1700’s onto what had previously been farmland. See the mirrors? They’re original and a couple years ago, someone walked in, saw them, and offered 2,400 pounds apiece. Wow. They are perfect though.

There has been some necessary sewage, electrical, vent remodeling but all in all it still works as a neighborhood pub. Has the old pull type taps and such. Not very good beer I’m afraid, but the company was interesting to talk to. Ended up spending quite a bit of time here in the evenings. Later that evening I was sitting out on the street at a picnic table outside of Carpenter’s having a beer and across the street a trans guy, or a crossdresser guy, was hamming it up with a young couple and their baby, getting a picture of himself with the baby and a selfie of all of them together. Wig, lipstick, feather boa, light cloak, heels, skirt, the works…but still obviously male. Then he bounds off across the street and kibitz a while with some guys standing around in front of the hostel smoking. Takes a selfie or two. Then he bounds over to me and asks to take a selfie (his own camera) of me and him. I’m finding him slightly amusing so I say yes. He flutters around for a half minute or so, takes the picture and then bounds off down the street hollering about nothing. I’m watching him when the waitress comes over and warns me about having stuff stolen by people like that. Oh, crap! I whip around and there on the picnic table, where the guy had draped his cloak for half a minute, my tablet was still sitting. Whew! That would have been a disaster to lose that. But she had reminded me of that kind of theft so from now on I planned on being on guard for that sort of ‘distraction’ thing. Turned out that on this day, the guy was harmless though a little unorthodox. Or maybe he would have grabbed my tablet if conditions had been a little different. Who knows?

As you can imagine, I was exhausted and headed off to bed early. Tomorrow, I’ll take a tour of London.