I guess I should start off with a little background huh? Do note that I'm writing this 1 year after going, so some of the details are fuzzy....

I've wanted to go to Europe for as long as I can remember. Once we finally had enough frequent flyer and hotel points saved up, my friend Dawn and I decided we were finally going to go. It took months to planning as both of us worked for Big 5 at the time, so arranging to get time off at the same time was going to take some work. We wanted to spend a couple week and see London, Paris, the French Riviera, and Switzerland. My schedule probably could have fit it in, but Dawn just couldn't take the much time out of her project. We eventually decided on a little over a week in London and Paris....the Riviera and Switzerland would have to wait. Since our frequent flyer miles were on Delta and our hotel points were with Marriott, a lot depended on blackout dates. When all was said and done we picked Sept 7, 2001 as our date of departure. We would return Sept 15, 2001. I was hesitant about missing the Florida vs. Tennessee game, but how many chances do you get to go to Europe? (all you Europeans reading this need not apply...lucky bastards) We made plans to leave Atlanta on the night of September 7th, arrive in London on the 8th, take the EuroStar train from London to Paris on the 12th, and return to Atlanta from Paris on the 15th. We would using beaucoup hotel points and stay at the Marriott County Hall 5-star accomodations in London and The Concorde 4-star in Paris. Neither of us had ever been, and we really didn't have any resources to check for recommendations, so we were going by guidebooks. We did all the necessary preliminary things like get our passports done, buy voltage converters, etc. Here is our story...

Sept. 7th I actually had a meeting this morning that I had to go to. Being the true Big 5 consultants/auditors we were, we held the meeting at a golf course. My group was holding a mini-tournament at the golf course where one of our partners was a member. Of course, I couldn't play because I had to catch a plane and take a loooooooong flight. I made the meeting though. I was glad I had an excuse such as an international trip in case I wanted to bug out of the meeting early. Of course I used that Get Out Of Jail Free card!

Eight hour flight. I have no problem flying, hell, I'd love to be a pilot myself if I could just find the time (and money). Boeing 777 is definitely the way to go internationally. I don't know how people travelled for long periods back in the day. Anyway...a few movies, some dinner, free alcohol, a book or two, and a nap pretty much took up most of my flight. I had never really used an airplane bathroom before....but on an 8 hour flight....you'll have to at some point, unless you have a titanium bladder, which I'm sure isn't possible.

Landed early Saturday morning. We had done our research and knew we needed to find the Gatwick Express train. Easy enough to find, there were signs all over the place. I decided to stop off at the ATM (sorry....cashpoint) since all I had was about $40 in American on me. For some reason, I thought it would take forever for the machine to figure out that I was using an American card, but out popped a pile of weird-shaped and coloured money. It was at this point that I realized that British currency isn't designed for American wallets. Oh well.

The train ride was non-eventful. From what I surmised, we were travelling through Londons suburbs, but I still can't tell you where Gatwick is in relation to anything! Our train took us to Victoria Station where we could walk to our hotel. If only we knew where we were going. The station is huge and there are hundreds of exits, I managed to take us directly to the wrong exit. Luckily, we were able to stop and ask directions from some of the helpful Underground workers. Eventually we got to our hotel (though I'm still unsure how!).

My first thoughts when I saw our hotel were disbelief. Aside from the fact that the London Eye (the worlds largest Ferris wheel) was right next to it and was immense. A plaque on the front of the building informed me that I would be staying in a building that is older than my native country. We checked in and found our room on the top floor, overlooking the Eye and some of the river. We were diagonally across the river from Parliament, but due to the location of our room, we couldn't see it. We were bloody tired (already picking up the lingo!!!) but didn't want to waste time by sleeping....we had limited time in this place and we didn't want to waste a moment. We decided to hop on one of the tour buses to get a feel of where everything was.

After a couple hours on the bus, we grabbed a bite to eat. At this time, I don't remember what we ate....but I remember ordering a Budwesier because it was an "import." :)


I had Dawn take a picture of me in front of our hotel on our first day. The Marriott County Hall served as London's County Hall (go figure) and lies right on Westminster Bridge Road. The London Aquarium is located in the basement just to the left of this picture.
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