3rd Day - London / York

Not much sleep as I worked on my assignment throughout the night. Drank a coffee around 2am because I was beginning to feel withdrawal symptoms (they did not give you much coffee on the plane) and I wanted to boost to finish off the assignment, and my sleep schedule was so thrown out anyway I felt a 2am coffee won't mess it up any more than it already was.

Finished the assignment in the early morning (finally!). Last thing I had to do was write 300 words on the considerations a business should be aware of when implementing AI, a subject I'm already very familiar with. Basically just plopped down my own thoughts and then just linked a bunch of publications as supporting evidence.

With the assignment done I napped for a bit before moving out into the city to meet Buckie. One thing I love is that lazy people here move over to one side on the elevator to allow others to pass on one side - very nice! A few months ago I was so frustrated by a pair of people that just HAD to stand next to each other for multiple elevators that I belted down the elevator coming up (fortunately empty of people) rather than continue to stand stationary behind them. Well done England!!!

Met Buckie at Gails. Food was absolutely delicious. Bit disappointed to later learn it is a corporate chain rather than owner operated. This was also my first time encountering different prices for takeaway vs dining in.

We then proceeded to go and meet Pod at the pub King Charles 1st. The pub is very old school and cozy. Small capacity, community run. Pod met Buckie on while he was streaming on Twitch, and is also involved in professional wrestling.

After that we went to have a ride on the London Eye, a giant ferris wheel which they built in the year 2000. Much like the Eifel(?) tower it was intended to be a temporary structure but was so well received that they made it permanent. View from the upper points was incredible and we had great weather for it.

We then proceeded to a small fish and chips place along the Thames(?), which Buckie had gone to just a few days before and highly rated it. The fish and chips were indeed delicious and the views were great. Photos on the wall showed that Pierce Brosnan had been here.

And in that theme our wandering took us past the MI6 building, something I recognised from the James Bonds films. You are able to go right up to it, although it is very heavily fortified.

At one of the train stations in our journey we encountered platform 9 and 3/4. There is half a trolley merged with the wall a long, long queue of people waiting to get their photo with it.

After much discussion of what to do, we came up with the following plan. Go north to see Hadrian's wall (one of my bucket list items) and take the ferry from Newcastle to Amsterdam. We also decided to go to York and stay the night rather than going all the way to Newie in one hit.

We then bid goodbye to London, though we both had to return to it in about a week to catch out return flights, and got on the train to York

On the north there were many, many jokes over who had the best seat.

Arrived at York. The town was absolutely awash with well dressed people out enjoying themselves. At first I thought there must be a wedding but it quickly became apparent there were too many people for this to be just one or even two big weddings, and the demographics of the people were heavily skewed male. Turns out it is "race day" and everyone comes from miles around.

With so many people in town there were no rooms at the inn. The hotel clerk guided us to the hotel next door. We walked into the lobby. It was exactly the same as the one we had just left. It even had precisely the same art. We joked that the same clerk was going to come out to greet us while pretending we hadn't just met.

After we check in, we deposited our bags in the room and headed out. We passed the same clerk directing a new set of visitors to our hotel. We strolled round town, taking in the old buildings and fortifications. There is a wall that used to protect the town but the town has long since expanded past it. It is in very good condition and very cool to see.

Tried to find a nice English pub to have a meal but they were all too loud and packed with the race day people, so we settled for fast food.Read more