HOME STRETCH FROM LONDON TO PORTLAND

The home stretch is the payoff for travelers.

Under budget, on time, no lost passports or ID? Check.

Spend the last night in London relaxing and resting up for the nine hour flight in the morning?

Wouldn’t that make sense? Resting up to sit for nine hours?

Or . . .

Two nights earlier I met a couple from Australia heading out to see Moulin Rouge at the Piccadilly Theater.

They said it was too expensive to see where they lived, but not in London where it cost even more.

That’s travel math working.

How much is a memory worth at home? Is it worth more in London?

For the last night of a three week run, us not the play, I thought about lazing around our 200 sq. ft. room and getting a good night’s sleep.

But good travel sense says you only need to get up in time to make it to the airport, get on the plane, and sleep there.

Makes sense looking back.

So off to the London drama we went.

 

Carnaby Street Home Stretch

We hailed a London cab and said Carnaby Street. They knew where to go.

Since the street names are world famous, they have special signs.

Carnaby Street led to SOHO.

What’s SoHo stand for?

We kept walking and checking our map, which means my wife checked the map while I eyed the crowd for a snatch and grab or a pickpocket.

Down one street, across another, and we found it, it being the Piccadilly Theater and Moulin Rouge.

The playhouse was next to two bars across the street from each other doing huge business with crowds of well dressed young people six deep on the sidewalks and street talking loud, real loud, louder than anything I’ve heard outside a sports arena, and drinking beer.

London street drama featured pretty young women in trench coats and shouty men in suits and jackets.

It looked like a sales convention floor with everybody buying something, or the floor of a commodities exchange.

Later inside the Piccadilly:

Was it a good play?

They used sampled music for a story line to sing and dance to.

And they were great singers and dancers, so yes, a good play.

 

Safe Travels Start The Night Before

Okay, the play was spectacular. We were surrounded by super fans who knew the numbers and sang along.

Once it was over we made our move for returning to the hotel, which meant finding a cab.

There was no cab to be found, so we retraced our steps to a busier street, waved a guy down, and called it a fitting finish to England this time out.

 

The next morning we had an Uber reserved for the run to Heathrow in plenty of time.

In British Airlines terminal 5 we made a couple of missteps, got in the right line, and made the plane in time for nice glass of 0range juice, water, or wine.

My obsession about holding onto the passports turned into holding onto the passports and the boarding passes.

My wife settled in and watched a movie. I saw Napoleon and the Bob Marley movie, took a nap, had a bite to eat, and tracked the flight over Iceland, Greenland, Canada, and down to Seattle for the connection to Portland.

In London took one terminal train to our gate; in Seattle we needed two terminal trains to get to the gate.

But the gate number had been changed. Now it was a tight window for our ride.

Since it was Seattle to Portland the boarding path led outside to an old fashioned set of temporary steps.

 

Good travel plans start months and months earlier for good travelers who enjoy seeing new things.

My plans are to not get stuck in the process.

I’m all about getting places and keeping to a routine of writing, walking, lifting weights, and hanging with my wife.

Anything more than that are extras.

The past three weeks has had all the extras and then some.

Then some? Like what?

Like driving 900 miles of English roads along the way.

That is 900 miles of ‘then some.’

And that was well before the home stretch.