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Christmas in London; New Year's in Edinburgh

Christmas in London; New Year's in Edinburgh

Old Jan 4th, 2017, 08:24 AM
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Christmas in London; New Year's in Edinburgh

I see many queries about Christmas in London, so I wanted to offer our experience as I certainly appreciated all the help I received from helpful people on the boards. We were not trying to see it all. My adult son & I were escaping what had been a sad year for us, and the trip was a wise and refreshing decision. I was last in London 40 years ago, and son was last there 20 years ago on a high school trip.

With my late husband, I would have been considered a budget traveler – Priceline’s “name your own price” often worked for us. Son does a lot of corporate travel and has developed “champagne” tastes (IMHO.)

Keep in mind that my definition of “cold” is probably different than yours. I’ve lived in Florida since I the age of 2 and son is a native (but he did live in NYC for a number of years.)

London weather: rainy Christmas day. Otherwise, highs of 45 – 50F, lots of sun.

December 23: overnight BA, Tampa to Gatwick

December 24: Thames Link into St Pancras International

London Hotel: St. Pancras Renaissance. We needed to stay at a Marriott property because son needed several days more to retain his platinum elite status, and St Pancras Renaissance was substantially less expensive than our other choice, County Hall. The room (modern wing) was rather bland standard Marriott/Fairfield issue, but what made our stay special was the Chambers Club, which we were able to access because of son’s platinum elite status.
Chambers Club was far beyond the traditional Marriott lounge with custom breakfasts, afternoon tea, pre-dinner canapés, evening cocktails,etc. It is absolutely gorgeous. (Another advantage: we usually only purchased one meal a day as so much food & drink was free.)
Another plus: Train and bus access was optimal because of King’s Cross.
Note: Without the Chambers Club, this hotel would not be a choice for me when I travel alone. For the family with platinum elite status or the $$$$ for a Chambers wing room, the treatment is royal.

Hyde Park Winter Wonderland: I was expecting a Christmas Market. Instead, it seemed we were at a much chillier and windier version of the Florida State Fair. The festival was packed. On Christmas Eve, the majority of the large crowd was family groups. It was fun to see the lighting and so many different families from different cultures all enjoying the rides and the food (and spending a small fortune.)

Carols by Candlelight, Royal Albert Hall, purchased in advance: According to the RAH website: “Celebrate in elegant style with this exquisite concert of carols and seasonal classics staged in full 18th Century costume in an evocative candle-lit style setting.”

This was delightful spectacle. The hall was magnificent; every seat was taken, and everyone enthusiastically sang carols. My “festivus for the rest of us” son commented that even he enjoyed it.

Food: the only meal purchased on the 24th was at Verdi Italian Kitchen at Royal Albert Hall. It was o.k. However, everything else at RA was fully booked by the time we started thinking of food!
Transportation: Tube (7-day Oyster Card, Zones 1-2) to Hyde Park; taxi to Royal Albert Hall; Bus back to King’s Cross.

December 25: Santa left us a large red stocking on our door with a clementine, a large iced shortbread Santa, some gingerbread cookies, and a cracker filled with chocolate. We were moving slowly this morning; breakfast was at the hotel. We walked (about an hour) to the Cumberland Hotel for the pickup of our 2 p.m. city tour with Golden Tours. After the tour we opted to be dropped off near Big Ben, did a bit of sight seeing, and picked up Golden Tour’s hop-on, hop off bus to get back to Kings Cross (free with our tour receipt.) We really enjoyed getting a feel for the locations that we would see later in the week, and a big plus was not being stuck in normal London traffic. We opted for the tour that provided a live guide rather than pre-recorded hop on, hop off information. In addition to Golden, Big Bus was running tours as was another group whose name escapes me. All of these buses were packed with people.
Note that by about 3:30 the sidewalks were thronged with people near all the major attractions. Any casual spot open (Pret a Manger, etc.) was absolutely swamped with long lines for the restrooms. There was even a long line at one of the iconic phone booths for picture taking. It was rainy and cold, but tourists were out and about.
Transportation note: No public transportation. Taxis (with a holiday surcharge) were plentiful as was Uber. The braver souls were utilizing the Santander bike rentals (aka Boris bikes.) I actually had downloaded the Santander app but chickened out when faced with the reality of bike riding. Some of the HOHO buses were making the rounds although attractions were closed.
Food: the only meal purchased was dinner. (Lunch was a Kind bar.) While we ate at our hotel, there were a number of restaurants open. (The St Pancras Renaissance provided us a long list for 12/22-12/28 several weeks before our travel as their restaurants were fully booked.) Once again, we did not plan ahead, but we were able to order dinner in the Chambers Club. Also, we saw more than a few Indian restaurants that were open.
December 26, Boxing Day:
I found this day hardest to plan because the big ticket museums were all closed, and we did not want to do a full day trip to outside of London.
We started with a bit of retail therapy, but abandoned that idea as the sidewalks were so packed by about 11:30 that we couldn’t move. At opening, the line to get in Harrods was over a block long at several of the entrances. I don’t need anything badly enough to get in that kind of crowd!
It was sunny, so we headed to the London Eye; I had splurged on “use any day” fast trak tickets before leaving home, and they were worth every penny as lines were long. We had a minimal wait and great views. We wandered through Southbank Christmas area and walked across a pedestrian bridge to the tube station.
Pre-theatre dinner was at Ivy Market Grill (really good! one of my favorite meals on this trip) and it was on to see Dreamgirls (purchased in advance) at the Savoy Theatre.
I headed back to the hotel and son did some bar hopping/clubbing. (Mom was definitely not invited!)
Transportation: tube
December 27: crowds, lots of crowds! We obviously weren’t the only vacationers in town. Those who celebrated Christmas at home had now joined us.
We started the day by catching part of the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace with thousands of others, and then we walked to Westminster Abbey and toured. A late lunch was at the Abbey.
We took the bus to Piccadilly Circus and son did some shopping in stores with brands not seen in our area of the states.
Son headed out for the evening; I walked through St Pancras International, visiting shops.
Transportation: tube, bus & foot
December 28: Tate Modern - spent about 3 hours here, but certainly did not have enough time to really see all there was to see. The buildings themselves are strikingly gorgeous.
Borough Market: we walked from Tate Modern and ended up having fish & chips for lunch at the market.
Dinner: Zuma
https://www.zumarestaurant.com/zuma-...don/en/welcome
Transportation: bus, tube, and foot
Regret: I had no idea the Christmas light show at Kew Gardens was a must-see until others at breakfast were raving about it. I tried to get last minute tickets, but it was sold out.
December 29: Morning was the British Museum. Then it was on to Edinburgh.
The afternoon was a delayed flight, schlepping luggage through the tube to DLR, up and down stairs, to London City Airport for a flight to Edinburgh. Once there, son headed out to explore, and I did laundry as our hotel had a free laundry.
Transportation: bus, tube, DLR, plane, Uber
Biggest regret of trip: We should have taken the train! The flight was booked before son booked the hotel. The train station was quite literally next to the hotel as was access to either Gatwick or Luten. Instead we hauled our luggage (luckily carryons only) up and down, up and down, and LCY was nothing to write home about.
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Old Jan 4th, 2017, 08:25 AM
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Edinburgh hotel: Residence Inn: this is a new hotel in the Quarter mile area. We liked the location as it was a bit quieter. It is within ¼ mile of the Royal Mile, next to a Starbucks and a Sainsburys Local. and restaurants are very close. Son chose it because it was a Marriott property, and it has free laundry – a very popular amenity. The room, a twin, had a nice sitting area, but the bathroom was a very poor design for non-couples as each of us ended up changing in the miniscule shower area as there was no door to the outer bathroom sink area from the bed/sitting area. Also, it was impossible to just turn on the light to the toilet area during the night. The light for the sink area also came on, increasing the light in the room. Luckily I had a flashlight!
GRRR. Fire alarms went off twice in the middle if the night; the first time, the staff on duty did not have code to turn it turn off, so it went on & on.
There is no A/C, so summer could be problematic. In fact, I opened the window a few times.
I was last in Edinburgh in 2009 – my husband & I were on a cruise that docked nearby and we took a bus into town for the day, so I had seen the castle and a few blocks of the Royal Mile. Husband had been previously and loved the city. Son had never been and wanted to see his father’s favorite city.
Weather: Wind was issue here; I really wished that the wool coat I left in Florida had been with me. The first two days had a high of about 50F. The last two the high was about 40F. At one point wind gusts were 60 kilometers per hour. A cold front also brought a bit of rain.
December 30: We started with a visit to the Edinburgh Castle; I had pre-booked tickets. By the time we left, the ticket line was L O N G. Then it was on to our 1 p.m. food tour with Eat Walk Edinburgh that was a lot of fun – 7 people, 5 places, both food and alcohol samples. (You can keep the haggis; I liked the ox cheeks and smoked salmon.) Alan, our guide, was great and told us a lot about the city as we covered 2.5 miles.
We were so full that we skipped dinner. On to Hogmanay and the torch run.
Big mistake: we should have watched it rather than participating in it. It just seemed to lack organization; 30,000 people crowding into one area, two or three people lighting torches, lots of wind and flying wax from the torches. Our jackets & jeans are covered in wax. I’ll be using the brown paper Whole Foods bags to iron out wax. The beginning wait (multi thousands of people crammed into a small area, some with backpacks and even a suitcase) had so much potential for a stampede that it was scary. Even though I never saw any large trucks in the area, I really thought about the Nice & Berlin tragedies as the only barricades were easily removable metal grills. Security was present, but those barricades didn’t do much.
Afterwards, I taxied home, and son partied the night away. Town seemed full of young men ready to party.
Transportation: foot, uber, taxi
December 31: The weather gods finally deserted us on day 9 of our trip. Enough wind to blow us around and rain as a cold front moved in. We began the day with Edinburgh’s Christmas area. This was more of the European Christmas market I had expected to find in London. Had hot chocolate at the National Gallery.
Son contributed to the economy at Jenner’s, a department store. Would you believe be purchased shorts and a t-shirt. Go figure….
Afternoon tea was at Collonades at the Signet Library. Just wow!
http://www.thesignetlibrary.co.uk/
Dinner was low key: http://www.nandos.com/
The area around the hotel was chock full of economical eats, obviously a university area
Hogmanay: son was actually back in the hotel a bit after midnight. He reported crowds were too dense for him. BBC2 reported 75,000 tickets sold for just the street party, and at least two other events associated with Hogmanay were in nearby areas – Concert in the Park and the Ceilidh.
Fireworks that I could see from the hotel were impressive.
For anybody “doing” Hogmanay, be sure to order tickets early. Some events were sold out several months in advance. Scots get 2 days off to recover from New Year’s Eve, and many of them need it.
From my hotel window I watched groups of young men harassing any woman that walked by – even chasing a few. I originally regretted not buying myself a ticket to the classical concert at St Giles, but I don’t think I would have really wanted to walk back alone.
January 1: son’s birthday!
We wandered about in a very, very chilly & windy old town until the National Museum of Scotland opened at noon.
A light lunch was at Doctor’s Pub Bar:
http://www.taylor-walker.co.uk/pub/d...inburgh/s9469/
They were out of all local beers on tap & most food. Apparently New Year’s Eve was a great success for them!
Dinner was at Angels with Bagpipes; I chose the place simply because the name had personal significance to us.
http://www.opentable.com/angels-with-bagpipes
Transportation note: we really did not take the time to familiarize ourselves with the bus system in Edinburgh, and we should have. We used taxis more than uber because uber was often a long wait or surge pricing.
January 2: uber to airport. Spent a bit of time at one of the Priority Pass Lounges and missed the beginning of boarding as it started about 40 minutes before flight time. Thus, we had to gate check luggage. My bag arrived in Tampa; son’s has supposedly been located and is on today’s flight. I was annoyed at having to gate check and then son noticed that our seats in the first row of premium economy London – Tampa were gone (bye bye extra leg room) and we were in another row.
London Gatwick: spent time in another Priority Pass lounge (son had to take advantage of that Chase Saphire Reserve perk.) When we boarded the plane, we found out another type of plane was subbed and most of Premium Economy was now seated in Business. I faced the back of the plane for almost 9 hours in my cubby and enjoyed my first international business experience.
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Old Jan 4th, 2017, 01:35 PM
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Thank you for sharing !
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Old Jan 4th, 2017, 02:36 PM
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Sounds like a fun trip! Thanks for sharing.
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Old Jan 4th, 2017, 10:41 PM
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>>There is no A/C, so summer could be problematic.
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Old Jan 5th, 2017, 08:36 AM
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Very detailed report, sounds like a fun time. I've been meaning of spending the holidays in either London or somewhere in South America for 2018.
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Old Jan 5th, 2017, 08:40 AM
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We hit a warm spell in Scotland in September 2015. A fan at night would have been great in Edinburgh and even the Outer Hebrides!
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Old Jan 23rd, 2017, 01:46 PM
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I don't know how I missed your TR??

>> this hotel would not be a choice for me when I travel alone. For the family with platinum elite status or the $$$$ for a Chambers wing room, the treatment is royal. >Then it was on to Edinburgh.The afternoon was a delayed flight, schlepping luggage through the tube to DLR, up and down stairs, to London City Airport for a flight to Edinburgh>as there was no door to the outer bathroom sink area from the bed/sitting area. Also, it was impossible to just turn on the light to the toilet area during the night. The light for the sink area also came on, increasing the light in the room. >enjoyed my first international business experience.
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Old Jan 24th, 2017, 07:24 AM
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Thanks for this interesting report. I made my very first trip to Edinburgh (and Scotland) this year on the day after all of the holiday festivities ended (January 8). Taking the tram from the airport into the city, I saw that they were busy dismantling all of the things that had been put up for the holidays -- the fun fair, the skating rink...

However, this was not at all depressing since I live in Paris and had already had my fill of the holiday season. It was nice to see things getting back to normal.

The weather was lovely except for a huge wind storm that was coming in on my last day. I was extremely impressed by the Ibis Styles hotel on St. Andrew Square but even more so because I had snagged at rate of £54 a night including breakfast while the listed rate at reception was £115 by the time I left.

Here is the report I made about my brief trip: http://tinyurl.com/orytoedi
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Old Jan 24th, 2017, 02:13 PM
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Your pictures are great, and it was enjoyable to see the streets with fewer people on them. I'm sure we missed quite a bit just trying to navigate the crowds.

Edinburgh is a city that fascinates me. I've seen it on a fantastic, sunny late spring day and then recently on chilly, windy days. In both situations, it just seems to evoke so much history and possibility.
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Old Oct 17th, 2017, 09:11 AM
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Thank you for this report. I am suddenly considering a solo mid-December to Mid-January trip to the UK (yes, late to make plans) and this is most helpful.
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Old Oct 17th, 2017, 09:46 AM
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Thank you for bumping, barbwire, I hadn't seen this before!

thanks for the trip report, I will now be prepared for wind! I'm rather glad I didn't make Hogamany reservations after all. (For those interested, the OP is right about advance reservations. Not only events- most lodging was sold out in September and what was left was very pricy.)

Great pictures, Kerouac! I'm so excited!
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Old Oct 26th, 2017, 07:37 PM
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I’d missed it too.... bookmarking for our Xmas adventure.
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Old Oct 27th, 2017, 08:20 PM
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Glad to have found your report. Especially interesting to read your New Year's impressions.

Also enjoyed Kerouac's linked from here.
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