London - 22 Mar 06

I am back, and starting where I left off with those London blogs. I wrote this one a couple days after Kate left and I summarize the week with her.

Wednesday: Kate and I got up early for my religion class. Class ran until 12 and it took forever to pass, the time that is. Kate sat downstairs in the café to study some. We went to The Ultimate Burger for lunch. It was excellent, our second favorite meal of the trip I think. We then went to the British Museum and whisked through there seeing as much as possible. Kate really liked it and I am glad we got to go there together. The London Eye was next. At $25 a ticket we paid more than a dollar a minute to ride all the way up and all the way down. It was worth it. It was sort of a hazy day, but at least it was sunny. We got some great pictures and Kate really wanted to see London from the air.

We walked to Westminster next and took a tour of the Abbey. After that it was back to Leicester Square for Wagamama again. We showed up in time to beat the big crowds. We headed home and packed for the Paris trip next.

Thursday: A trip on the Eurostar from Waterloo to Gare du Nord in Paris took 2.5 hours. The train seemed like it was reaching speeds of 150 mph through the French countryside. The Chunnel portion of the track only takes about fifteen minutes. Paris was cold and dirty, and very confusing at first. It took us some time to get some money and buy a ticket on the Metro, but we found our hotel near a street that we named the Rue de la Poo. This street was covered in dog poop and seriously, some of the poo looked like it had come from dog’s owners instead.

I had a bit of a breakdown when I saw the room because I envisioned something much nicer. I would have spent another $100 to improve the room at a drop of a hat. I got over the room and headed to the Opera House for the bus. We rode the bus to the Champs Elysees and got off there. We walked around and saw the Arc de Triomphe, the Renault F1 Store, Louis Vuitton, and most importantly, the McDonalds and the pattiseries. We eventually found ourselves at Trocadero for an awesome view of the Eiffel Tower. We stood around under the Tower figuring out what to do for a while. We decided to eat at Champ de Mars for €6.50 cokes. The place wasn’t that bad, except for the cokes. Now, all the way up to the top of the Eiffel Tower. It was sort of a scary ride, and the top is so high. It was one heck of a view though. The open top platform was extremely windy and cold. Our stay at the top wasn’t long. We had a very cold walk back to the Metro station.

The perfect end to the day was trying to sleep in a European double bed with Kate.

Friday: First to McDonalds for breakfast, then to the Louvre. My thoughts on the Louvre: great works of art and all that, but its potential drowns in the sea of people and a building that is too large. It was great and all, but that is because I am not an art nerd. If I cared about seeing everything I would really hate that museum; too big, mazy, crowded, and noisy. We walked to Pont Neuf and had great pizza by Notre Dame. The church was magnificent and free which was shocking to me after being confronted with all the entrance fees for cathedrals in England. I was pleasantly surprised by the freebie. We went back to the Champs Elysees and accomplished some eating and shopping before catching the train back to London. We were happy to return on St. Patrick’s Day to thousands of drunken Londoners singing to strangers on the Tube. It was marvelous.

Saturday: Buckingham Palace, we missed the changing of the guard, but we did get to see the lone guard and Kate got a picture with him. We bought some good pastries and found our way to the National Gallery for some shopping in their great store. We then had Mexican food in London. It was not horrible, but I wouldn’t recommend it to others. St. Paul’s was next and it was just as good a view from the top of the dome at is was from the Eye. This might have been due to the clarity of the day, but it was simply awesome.

We crossed Millennium Bridge to the Tate Modern. We really enjoyed this day. We had a chocolate cake for dinner that tasted sort of fishy. We packed Kate’s bags for tomorrow’s flight.

Sunday: It was a tearful goodbye due to us reminding one another throughout the week, by simply being around each other, that we are so blessed to have one another, and to love each other as much as we do. It was quiet and lonely coming back to Muswell Hill. I miss Kate’s laughs and her face underneath mine with those beautiful eyes in squinted lids looking up at me. God has blessed it.

Paris is romanticized so much in prose, poetry, movies, and all forms of fiction that it could not possibly live up to the hype. It didn’t. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Paris, but it is still a massive city with loads of traffic and trash. What I saw of Paris before I went wasn’t what I saw of Paris while I was there. That’s all.

I remember being so excited to return to London after being gone a day and a half. To return to the Tube after riding on the Metro for a couple days was a relief. The Metro works, but it doesn’t work like the original.

Kate and I did as much as possible while she was here. I felt pretty humbled by the places we got to see and the things we got to do because Kate and I didn’t have to wait until we were 60 to see this part of the world. A lot of people will have to wait half a century to see London and Paris together, and some never will. Hey, look at me, I am rubbing it in. Sorry.

The goodbye was hard. I watched Kate until I could not see her over crowds or through walls. I finished reading In Cold Blood as the Piccadilly line took me from one end of suburban London to another; back home to Muswell Hill and a quiet house, all alone in London.

Picture: From the top of the dome of St. Paul's toward the front of the church.

Picture: Kate in the crazy traffic of Paris.