I’ve been to London numerous times now, and I’ll admit it. I’m a sucker for “the Eye“, or more precisely “The London Eye”…. The amusing part is it’s been owned/sponsored by a different entity virtually every time I have visited, which is admittedly every 2 years (except for that blasted Covid thing). Currently, lastminute.com is the name to grace the wonderful attraction. Can’t help but wonder who will be the next one. Anyway, after leaving the home of the world’s most famous detective, I made my way across London for my 1700 booking on the The Eye. When Melanie and I were scheduled to come over in 2020, I had…
221b Baker Street
So, from last time, after wandering around in the rain for a bit, fruitlessly searching for one of the London Landmarks with an open booking schedule, I refocused my search a little closer to where I was. And there it was, 221b Baker Street, the “home” of the worlds most famous (imaginary) detective, Sherlock Holmes. Being a bit of a Holmes aficionado, I headed in that direciton. It was a few short blocks away, and the first thing I noticed what that there was an extended queue (line, for those non-Anglophiles) waiting to enter. Dang. Right next door is the “London Beatles Store”, albeit obviously for sale…: Being a Beatles…
Regent’s Park
After a hearty English breakfast at the Melia White House, I poked my head outside to get a feel for the weather in ‘ye Old London. Ich. Cold, damp, rainy, dreary. Welcome to London…. Not to fear, I’ll do the various museums today and stay inside, mostly. Firing up the handy tablet I find that our friend Mr. COVID has driven another interesting perturbation into the London tourist experience. Booking times for museums. No booking, no entrance. Yippie ki yay. It was Sunday morning and and open bookings amongst the desirable venues was not be found. Great. Plan B. The hotel is literally next to Regents Park, so, donning my…
Happy Mother’s Day
Good morning to all and Happy Mother’s day to the wonderful mothers out there. The mothers in our society don’t get the gratitude we should all be paying for their tireless efforts in leading the transition from birth to adulthood. It’s a difficult, herculean task, yet they handle it with aplomb and grace, mostly…. 🙂 Typically there would be a plethora of happy mother’s day photo’s to accompany this post…. Typically…. If I had any….. H’mmm, major fail there dude. MAJOR FAIL….. 🙁 This is rather embarrassing. The image catalog has photos of virtually EVERY event in our lives, except Mother Day. Wow, Simply wow. So, today I’ll make a…
Portobello Road
Way back, when I was in college, the last summer before graduation, I decided to do a study abroad session courtesy of the UNO Innsbruck International Summer School. This is a 7 week summer school program in Innsbruck, Austria. I was in need of 2 courses of “fine arts” to complete my engineering degree, and this seemed like a great way to get that done. As part of the study program, they were offering a 3 week tour starting in London, heading down through Paris, across through Pisa and finally winding up in Innsbruck. So the summer began with a plane ride to London with the 40 or so other…
Chris’ Excellent European Adventure
On March 12, I was fly out of Washington Dulles airport (IAD) headed for London Heathrow (LHR) the next day. I was traveling to attend Oceanology, which I had done every other year since 2010. Except for 2020. We all knew what happened then…. This part of the trip was a company sponsored professional development plan. Oceanology is the leading conference in underwater technology, and I’ve been in the underwater business for virtually my entire professional career. It’s a good conference with the latest and greatest ongoings in the industry. As part of this “boondoggle”, I decided that while I was in the “neighborhood”, I would travel to Greece and…