MaiTaiTom Gets The Royal Treatment…Two Weeks Exploring London and Scotland
 

We’re off and running on the UK trip report. Tracy and I, along with friends Kim and Mary, took advantage of a ridiculous springtime airfare to London and decided to spend 15 days exploring London (four nights), Edinburgh (four nights) and the Scottish countryside (seven nights). It was our first trip to Scotland, and it certainly will not be the last. As usual we traveled at a fairly frenetic pace, but we definitely made some time to stop and smell the haggis.

Our first stop was London, and today is Chapter One featuring our first day there. Although we only had half a day after we arrived, we had enough time for a pub lunch, a quick stop to check in on the Queen, a visit to Diana’s ancestral home, evening cocktails at our cool hotel and dinner at a fabulous London Indian restaurant. Some like it hot, baby!

Thanks to everyone who helped on the Scotland plans, with special thanks to Janisj and Gardyloo for helping map out a navigable route. You'll be happy to know we didn't kill anyone, human or animal. In fact, we had very, very little traffic anywhere we traveled.

As always, my report makes no sense unless you follow along with photos (some might say it doesn't make sense with the photos, but that's another story. Plus this site is increasingly hard for me to navigate (can't preview either), so hopefully you don't mind looking at the report with the photos on my website. The Scottish countryside makes good photo taking pretty darned easy, as you will see early in the report. Special thanks to Kim and Tracy who took many of them.

Here is the link to Day One. Thanks for following along.

<B>http://travelswithmaitaitom.com/chapter-one-london-calling/</B>

Yay, I've been looking forward to this!

Thank you! Looking forward to reading your trip report. Let the adventure and fun begin.

And we're off!

I'll check back often.

On for the ride, Maitaitom, been waiting for this to turn up.

BTW, took your advice and had lunch at L'ange20 when I was in Paris in May. Of course it was just as you said, not only delicious but a fun place. I especially got a kick out of that poor server running around like a chicken to take care of a packed room full of hungry people, mainly French.

Yes, this website is becoming more and more difficult to navigate and the "oldies" seem to be departing in droves. Wish I knew where they are going so I could follow. :)

Another one on board for the ride through he heather.

Looking forward to it.

Loved the start- farewell to arms and second to naan hooked me right in!

Joining in for the adventure.

"second to naan "

Poor old Kim has had to put up with that one for nearly 50 years. I hope I do Scotland justice when I get to that part. What a magical place! I can see why Janis and others keep returning.

((H))

Joining in, too!

Scotland is magical, indeed. Thanks for taking us along.

Great! I love your reports Tom. As always, an excellent humorous start :).

> and (gasp) clean bathrooms (they even cleaned them in flight)<.

How low our expectations these days. In my brief 6 month career as a flight attendant with Wardair in Canada when I just moved there (could not get a 'proper' job'), bathrooms were inspected and CLEANED every 15/30 minutes! Whoa betide you if you had a dirty toilet in your section!

Following along and looking forward to more.

regards Ger

are we there yet!

Oh -- this will be fun --

(tiny carping - really teensy - Nairn and Falkland are singular . . . no 'S' )

"Nairn and Falkland are singular . . . no 'S' )"

Too much Whisky!!!! Keep me honest on this.

((H))

Looking forward to the rest!

Loving every minute of this- we leave for London next month so hoping to pick up a idea or two!

Loved the beginning. Can't wait to read the rest. We will be headed to London in a few weeks and then to Scotland later in the summer. Getting some good tips!

Aye, on board too!