Today marks the end of our time in non-English speaking countries.
We enjoyed out last breakfast at the club lounge and said goodbye to Disneyland Paris. We had made arrangements with a recommended towncar/shuttle for transportation to Gare du Nord Train Station.
Our driver picked us up right on time and off we went. [Editor's note: On some days of the week, you can take a Eurostar train from Disneyland Paris directly to London. Thursdays are not one of those days, however.]
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| Ready for our ride to the train station. |
The drive into town was nice. It was fun to drive around in Paris...great people watching and more amazing buildings along the way. And just to note... I am not mentally prepared to drive in Paris... not sure I ever will be. Wow! I so appreciated our driver's calm manner.
The train station was busy, but we found our way to the Eurostar area to check in. Which was mostly just dealing with Customs or Border Control, I guess. We technically (can you see the air quotes?) left France and were stamped into England before we got the train. Our timing was prefect. By the time we finished that we walked into the waiting area and they announced boarding. Woo Hoo... Love it when that happens.
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| Borading the train! |
Boarding this with suitcases in tow was soooo much easier than the TGV we took to Disneyland Paris from the Airport. Having a car attendant helped... just to tell us where to put things. We were settled in no time.
This was a great ride... comfy, decent food, and a fun app for the kids to try out while we were in the tunnel. The app is kind of a VR look at what might be beyond the tunnel... like what fish might be swimming past as we go through at a rather fast speed.
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| Settled into the train. They had a screen above us with info about the trip and safety information. |
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| A little trivia for you |
The fastest they told us they were going was 296 km per hour... I won't do the math for you, call it a learning experience.
A little over 2 hours later we were pulling into London! The hardest part of the journey was navigating the luggage from the station to our flat for the next two days (did you catch that? Flat... see how I picked up a British term, cool huh?)
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| Welcome to London! |
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| The London Underground! |
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| This is not suitable for rolling luggage. Ha ha, we were not sure we would get to the other side with all our wheels still intact. |
We are staying in an apartment for all you who need the american version ;) It's more than a studio, but not a two bedroom. Has three beds, a kitchen and two baths. Just a washing machine - no dryer, so we are being thoughtful about what we wash, as it will need to hang dry.
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| View from our flat. |
Once we got into the unit the kids both relaxed... almost to the point we weren't sure we would keep our afternoon plans of going to the British Museum.... spoiler: we didn't go.
Hubby ran out to get water and snacks etc. and we lazed in the room for a bit. Deciding we all needed some down time and we didn't want to be worn out before our evening plans.
After a relaxed bit we headed to Paddington Station (closest Underground station) and found some dinner. Then took a few trains to Green Park, where our London at Night Bus Tour departed from. Additionally, it was close to a store I was keen on checking out, so some of us may or may not have spent our London allowance before our tour. [Editor's note: If you had to bet, go with "may"]
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| What? Where are we? |
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| Ok, now I am really confused. |
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| This feels right... a lovely wall of tea cups. |
With a little bit of time left before our tour and some on and off rain, we found a covered bench in Green Park and again relaxed while we waited for the tour start.
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| In Green Park, waiting for our tour to begin. |
The tour turned out to be great. A small portion of the top deck was covered and we were able to get seats up there. So we were dry, when it was raining (only for part of the tour) and we had great views. The tour guide was lots of fun and the driver was skilled.... Man, London and Paris... not gonna drive in those towns. [Editor's note: Me either. I have, however, driven in Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Munich. I don't mind driving in any of those cities.]
After the tour we took the train back to our flat.. and good night.
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