erinb

hi everyone,

Our London trip is back on....yippeeeee!

Okay, we have the hotel, Millennium Gloucester,at absolute steal rate.

We have the air tickets...you are not going to believe the price... one free, one for $350 round trip RDU to Gatwick. That is with trading in some air miles or we lose them.

Our schedule is oct 15-oct 24.

We would love for everyone to look over our iteniary and see what we may be missing. We have already been to london twice and done all the regular tourist stuff (westminster, tower of london, london eye, shakespeare theatre, hampton court, bath ,stonehenge). This trip is about relaxing and doing thestuff we missed and just...shopping.

if you can think of some interesting out of the ordinary activities we would love to hear them.

see iteniary next post

(cont)

erinb

Our iteniary is as follows:

Thursday oct 16th
Arrive London at 7am on oct 16th
Travel via train to Victoria Station
Then metro to hotel to store luggage and register.(check is at 2pm)
Off to English Breakfast across the street
Then St Pauls Cathedral or Kensington Palace while we wait for hotel then
Check in hotel, shower, nap then dinner and then Jack the Ripper Walk

Friday oct 17th
Windsor day trip
arrive back in london for brief rest then Dinner

Saturday oct 18th
Camden Market together then
afternoon on own for shopping and bookhunting, meet back at hotel for late dinner

Sunday oct 19th
Bayswater Art walk by the park
Museum day for me:
Victoria & albert
Natural Science & history or
British Museum

afternoon shopping for co-traveler
meet up at hotel early evening for dinner

Monday oct 20th
?? this may be another day trip any suggestions?

Tuesday oct 21st
morning:
Madam Tussards
Planatarium

Afternoon:
Kensington palace or st. pauls
Back to hotel to change then
High tea
shop for a while then
early play then
late dinner

Wednesday oct 22nd
??last minute sites?? any suggestions?

Thursday oct 23rd
Free day for last minute shopping and stuff meet up at hotel to change and then Thames Dinner Cruise

Friday oct 24th
big english breakfast
then checkout
departing around noon


okay this is just a very loose first draft. We welcome any suggestions. One note..this trip as stated will be somewhat relaxed. We are in no rush. We are firm about the 1st two days however because these are things that we have missed both of the last two trips and promised ourselves we would do first...jack the ripper walk and windsor all day trip. My friend is interested in everything but the museums...she is all done with those and I will be on my own for bookhunting.

One question: I had heard that the best way to find good used books is to visit the charity shops??? is this true? I am not looking for rare books, just good cheap paperbacks. Are there many in central london or will I need to visit outside to find those?

We are also looking for a good suggestion for another day trip? We thought cantebury but are looking for suggestions.

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks
Erinb

LVSue

I loved Greenwich--there's something about that Mean Time line--in fact we prefer to do that the first day because it keeps us awake and in the sunlight (optimist that I am).

Rich

On Sunday, Speakers Corner at Hide Park near Oxford St, can be a hoot. It is informal, usually starting around 9:ish and never the same two time is a row. It can get a little political sometimes, but you just walk away to another character on a box and see what he/she is raveing about.

You can do it on the way to the Bayswater Art.

Enjoy . . Rich

Scarlett

erinb,
looks good to me, although sadly, Museum Day will be just a quick look at each. Each of these museums is Huge! and requires a day to see, but a little is better than none!
Personally, I love London in October, we never ever had a rainy day
Having been there before, do you have favorite places to shop or are you looking for anything particular? I do love to shop in London~

obxgirl

Great to hear your trip is on for the fall!

There is a second hand bookfair held on the South Bank under the Waterloo Bridge. Riveside Walk market is held Sat and Sun, noonish to 4 or 5 in the afternoon I think. That would fit into your Saturday schedule.

Also, here is a link I picked up from this list a while back:

www.geocities.com/Athens/4824/uk.htm

This is a woman who maintains the most remarkable list of bookstores (new and used) worldwide. Her London list is extensive. And at the risk of incurring the
wrath of those who tell people not to do a search, I did a search before our last London trip on "bookstores and London" and "used books and London" and found lots of good info.

Charity shops are good places to find books although the selection can be quirky and spotty. There are plenty of charity shops in London, and although I know you'll find them everywhere in England, I seem to recall a high concentration of charity shops in Oxford. That might be an enticement to make Oxford your additional day trip. Canterbury is also a wonderful town and the cathedral is gorgeous.

I think your plans look pretty relaxed overall. The V&A is my favorite and geographically it would make sense to pair that with the history or science museums. That's a lot to see in a day but certainly doable to be able to see some of each. The British Museum has late openings on Thursday and Friday evenings (till 8 or 8:30 I think) and while all of the galleries aren't open, enough of the ones with the "greatest hits" are open to make it worth a trip. Crowds really thin out in the evening too.

Have a fantastic time planning your trip!

dln

Erinb, when you go to St. Pauls, climb to the very top and you will be rewarded with a wonderful view of the city.

Canterbury makes a great day trip. It gave us literary shivers to think that we were the modern day pilgrims of the Canterbury Tales (and brought back memories of freshman english class, too...)

Another great day trip is Oxford. We are partial to Oxford because my husband degreed there, but still, it's a great college town. And it has a great bookshop, which you might like. The colleges are all so architecturally different and it makes for a great day just to stroll around the High Street and take it all in.

erinb

hi everyone,

We thought about oxford for a day trip also, although my friend is not really a book nut like I am so unless they have a lot of shops.....

As far as shopping goes...we have never had enough time in london to really explore the shopping. my friend always spends a half a day or more in harrods each time she goes. She usually ends up with a 2 year want list to buy when she gets there.

you know, as far as shopping in london, I can't off the top of my head think of any one particular area. we have been twice before to london and always went site seeing rather than shopping. our first time in 1995 and then when we went again with a group of 5 women in 2001.

our shopping consisted of harrods, portabello market, and then the tourist thingys.

for my friend that is what this trip is about...shopping. she has finished the main sites except for the ones listed on the first two days.

for me it is bookhunting and museums...the group didn't really want that the last time so I missed out. Scarlett you are probably right about the British Museum, so I will make that another day and just do V&A and the science museum on sunday.

obxgirl, thanks for your suggestion about the river walk market. I vaguely remember that mentioned once before and will look into it. It would be perfect for a saturday afternoon.

I also love London in October. Knock on wood, but not once have we had bad weather. Oh, an occasional light right, but not what people had warned us about. It's crisp and wonderfully fall.

We really would have like to visit this time in the spring to see the bloom, but
it just didn't work out this year.

Thanks for all the suggestions!

I am topping this to see if I can get any others.

janis

Oxford would be good for your day trip. Besides the beautiful colleges -- there are more shops than a person could visit in a week let alone a day. Plus the wonderful covered market. And of course, Blackwells - which at one time was the largest book store in the world - don't know if it still is.

BoulderCO

If you are looking for restaurants near your hotel try Black and Blue - excellent chicken and fish, moderately priced wine list, friendly service. Also La Sala Romano - excellent italian food, nice atmosphere, good house wine. Both restaurants are right across the street from your hotel. I still don't understand why the two Millenium hotels in Kensington are so low-priced. They are quite nice and their location is superb. These hotels are the best deal I have seen in London. We have certainly paid more and gotten less on previous trips.

erinb

hi boulderC0,

I totally agree with you about the hotel, although I understand that the standard twin's can be quite travel worn.

We picked it for the location and of course the special rate we got.

as for the location, you can not ask for a better hotel. The area is great, plenty of restuarants and stuff and most importantly...the gloucester tube stop is literally right across the road from the hotel and connects with three of the lines.

On our last trip, we had to walk over 10 blocks from our hotel to the closest tube stop and let me tell you after a long day it was exhausting trek back to the hotel.

I am sure there are better hotels, but the location and area of these two can't be beat for the price we are getting.

eliztrav

You could consider splitting your day away from London...am, Blenheim and pm Oxford. They are fairly close to eachother. There is a small bit of shopping on the Blenheim grounds! Mostly, however, it is an incredible house and even more incredible grounds. They have a website, though I don't have the link handy. Google it for a quick find. Oxford has plenty of shops. And, as another poster mentioned, Blackwells. We ended our last day there with a drink at the oldest pub (the one with the cut off ties) and dinner at Browns. Easy one hour train ride back to London's Paddington Station.