Miguel Keenanan - Mike's Big Adventure 2004

Day Two: London (The Big Smoke)

The Strand Palace : 5:30am

Ah London .

I awake in the surroundings of my hotel room, curtains gently swaying in the breeze, crisp warm sheets and a faint smell of lavender. There's a faint knocking as my breakfast is delivered to my door, I thank the young man who has delivered my morning subsistence and look down at his outstretched palm...

I give him some skin.... urban, that's me.

Only later does it occur that he was looking for a tip. The cheeky cockney scamp.

Undeterred by this blatant attempt to fleece me, I open the window and butter my croissant. (Not a colloquialism, it's a continental breakfast).... and what sound introduces me to our nation's great capital?

A Cockney Boy shouting the front-page headline from the Morning Standard?

A Nightingale singing on, the admittedly distant, Barclay Square ?

Maybe a flower girl going about her morning business, "Awww away wif ya Captain!"?

No… it's the sound of a bin lorry backing up. Welcome to London .

Still, the jam is first rate, the tea sublime, the crackers are a little stale to be honest but I'll let that go, it's early.

I mull over my plans, I certainly have a full day ahead. I have planned to visit as many tourist locations as possible before returning to the hotel at no later than 17:00. I figure that this will allow plenty of time to shower and change before making the short journey over to Her Majesty's Theatre (apparently not her property, in the same way Madam Tussaud wasn't about for an autograph), for the show at 19:30.

It's good to have a plan, some Mice told me that once... and more than a few Men.

06:15am: The Strand to the Thames .

Out I set following the most bracing shower I've ever endured. Trafalgar Square turns out to be a very short walk from the hotel and so I continue to Her Majesty's Theatre to scout out the route, it's not very far at all which bodes well for this evening's entertainment.

From the theatre I walk over towards The Mall but turn left before reaching Buckingham Palace . I'm now to the left of the Royal Family. Me and Adolf Hitler.

Now, it's a strange thing. You spend all this time when you're younger under the impression that central London is huge, the Queen needs a carriage to get from the Palace to Parliament, but it turns out she's not exactly giving those horses a decent workout. All of the tourist attractions are in a very compact area; you'd have to be a complete fool to get lost. More on that later.

I cut across Horse Guards Parade and emerge onto Whitehall . I can see Big Ben in the distance, looking remarkably, well, not all that big. I pass Downing Street where armed police carefully watch me until I move along, (maybe the turban was a mistake this morning), and onto the seat of democratic power in this our great and just land.

No-one's in.

Apparently they're all on holiday, summer break and all that... MP's and Teachers, they only get into it for the holidays.

Still no-one has told the Anti-War protesters who are out with their banners and bullhorns and poor personal hygiene. I comment to one of them that there are currently no MP's in the building to lobby.

"That's what they want us to think, they hide behind their high walls but they're there".

I explain that they're really not... as a matter of fact the only people who are there are the cleaners.

"Well they have a lot to clean up, the corruption and the hate and the..."

He's still talking when I turn the corner and head down towards the river.

The Thames , you've got to love it. If anyone fancies an "I'm the Second Coming" Prank, (Not you Tony you've done enough damage next door), you should come down to the Thames and walk across. It'd be easy enough, as long as your shoes didn't dissolve.

A funny joke, some might say, (well OK, I might say), but it's apparently completely unjustified. As a young tour guide told me later in the day, (bit of a personal tour, she obviously didn't spot the wedding band... they can't help themselves.. only human), the Thames is apparently one of the cleanest rivers in Europe . The colour of the water is due to sandy deposits being constantly churned up by the fast current. That's right; I learnt facts on this trip other than the percentage of every beverage in the mini-bar. Go ahead and be impressed.

07:15am: Second Breakfast

Hobbits are massively underestimated in my book, (which obviously isn't “The Lord of the Rings” in which their worth is well recognized). They are after all the inventors of "Second Breakfast"... although they never pay for it if they're in a group.

“Do you mind getting today's...? You see, I'm a little short”

I am funny.

I found myself at a little cafe by the Thames , which was opening for Breakfast. I picked up a cup of tea and a Danish pastry, I tried to pick-up the Danish waitress but she was having none of it. Obviously gay, which is her choice and let no-one say otherwise.

But she wasn't exactly cheerful either, Les Miserables sprang to mind, I can't imagine why.

So, I picked out a spot on the waterfront and relaxed for a while whilst I consumed the expensive tat peddled to me by the miserable European. No point charging around the place, I had all day. And I got to thinking, how many people would be undertaking this very same adventure? Manchester-London-Edinburgh on their own. Not many. Why is that?

Because no-one is quite as sad as I am? No... Plenty of people are as sad as I am.

Then it hit me. This was a unique experience, one that should be grabbed with both hands, documented, celebrated, never forgotten. I returned to the Miserable Lesbian Danish Waitress and ordered a second pastry.

You Only Live Once.

09:00am - The London Eye

"Gee so how tall is it exactly?"

About 1500 Denari I explain.

"Denari?"

A new measurement we brought in especially for the Millennium. 1 Denari is exactly the height of a beefeater's boot.

"Gee, there's so much to take in here... you guys are certainly interesting."

I've managed to attract an American Family who have mistaken me for a kind natured passer-by and expert on all thing's "British".

"Why do each of the capsules have British Airways on the front of 'em?"

They're made of pre-millennium jumbo jet windscreens for strength I explain... whilst carefully edging backwards towards an escape route.

“Gee, well we might go up, are you getting a ticket...?"

No, I've been on it tons of times... they let everyone from England on once a month for free... sorry about that. Have a nice day.

I remove myself from the situation, as nice as Mr and Mrs Rumsfeld are I'm beginning to feel guilty about telling them that Waterloo Station is a registered Catholic Church, with masses every day at 15:00.

Still, lovely people.

I later recounted the above story to a friend and received the reply, “Only you would do that”. I still haven't figured out whether this was a scolding or a compliment.

Looking up at the "Eye" you realise that it is an incredible feat of engineering. To think that there were complaints about the construction of this "EYEsore" (get it?) before the 2000 opening. It is now one of the most visited tourist attraction in Europe , turning a profit in just 2 years of operation. So did I ride it?

No.

Because I am a complete coward. I did take pictures and even considered buying a "I rode the London Eye" t-shirt (no ride required). "See London from above the rooftops" the marketing proclaims. I did that on the plane in thanks, no need to spend 20 quid to do it again. Jumbo Jet Windscreen protected pod or no.

I instead chose to take the Millennium Bridge back to the other side of the river.

11:00am: Piccadilly Circus .

I have never been anywhere as busy as this... You should have heard them laugh at the Pizza Hut when I stumbled in and proclaimed,

"... Phew! Thank God I'm inside. It's like Piccadilly Circus out there...”

It's obviously the first time they'd heard this joke, as it took them a little time to get it. Eventually one girl gave out a very pointed "HA!" and I felt justified in my comic bubble.

Seriously though. I fought, I kicked, and I let an old man through in front of me... that turned out to be a really ugly old lady.

What a place.

At the time of my visit scaffolding obscuring the famous lights ruined the effect of the famous landmark. It did strike me that as much as people come to admire this part of London and to photograph each other in front of the billboards, they're still only adverts. If you stop to think about it, the healthiest thing you could eat from all the adverts up there is probably Fuji camera film.

I bet this is what hell is like for Vegans. With a huge Ronald McDonald Devil presiding over the reprocessed meat feast.

Yes… I bet it's just like that… Exactly.

High Noon: Her Majesty's Theatre

As I walked down the road known at Haymarket, (no hay on sale incidentally), everything began to look strangely familiar. I decided it was time to seek professional London Tour help.

Now, there are a number of open top buses and I must admit that I was having trouble deciding which would be the best use of my hard earned cash. That is, until a passer-by noticed my trouble and stepped over to help.

"Hi Guv'"... I SWEAR, He called me Guv... “Having trouble choosing between the buses? ... I know, it's murder, but me and the wife took The Big Bus Company tour the other week and it was pucker"… (Ok, he didn't say Pucker... that's me embellishing).

Great, I thanked this gent for his assistance; I would take the next Big Bus Company bus that arrived... Where would I be able to purchase a ticket?

“One Adult 'Guv? ... 18 quid."
Cheeky Cockney Bus Conductor! I was momentarily stunned by his blatant lies, but I still gave him my money. After all, I'm a weak willed fool.

Continued Here...