Italy November 2005 - Day 8 - London

London

So I suppose this isn't the Italy travel journal any more since I'm about to tell you about London, but Italy was the bulk of our vacation so I'm sticking to my title.

We had to get up really early to make our 7:50 AM flight to London. I was feeling no better than I was the day before. In fact, I felt worse. The taxi picked us up at 5:45 for our only taxi ride of our vacation. At 45 Euros it certainly was an expensive ride, but there was really no other way to get to the airport that early in the morning.

We arrived at the airport in what, I'm sure was record time. On the way, the Colosseum and the Baths of Caracalla went by in a blur. We also drove past what looked like an aqueduct. What we were told was a 30 minute drive was actually 20 minutes, but the taxi driver drover like a bat out of hell. He was insane. Thank goodness we had seat belts (though evidently he didn't feel the need to wear his).
By the time we got to the airport and waited in line for about 30 minutes to check in, I was feeling really awful and very very dizzy and embarrassingly enough, nearly passed out at the check-in counter. I ended up sitting down on the ground. I think the check-in clerk was concerned. Roger helped me outside for some fresh air while I roused what strength I had to keep going. I hadn't felt that sick in a long long time and it was a horrible and helpless feeling.

I slept for much of the flight to London, though I did eat the small breakfast snack they served and I think that helped a bit. When we arrived in London, I was still feeling awful and the one hour tube ride into the center of town didn't help matters. I had no idea Heathrow was so far out of the city!

We arrived at the hotel early, but luckily they had a room. Once again I felt faint and had to sit down when we were at the reception desk. I think I got a little curt with the lady when she kept asking us questions ("Do you want to receive the paper?") when all I really needed was to lie down.

We went up to the room and I collapsed on the bed and slept for several hours. I woke up feeling weak, achy and freezing cold, even though the temperature in the room was perfectly normal. I roused myself, took a dose of cold medicine (luckily I had some on hand since I had though I was getting sick when we were leaving Austin) and we headed out onto the cold London streets. We started out by looking for some food and found a little Indian restaurant a couple of blocks from our hotel. Being sick, I wasn't hungry and couldn't taste properly, but Roger enjoyed his.

We decided to purchase tickets for a sightseeing bus tour. They have a double-decker bus and you can hop on or off at any of the stops and there is a guide pointing out all the major sites. We stayed on that for some time, though we didn't go onto the top because it was outside and it was sprinkling and well, I was sick. We hopped off near the London Dungeon because I needed to use the bathroom. I was feeling a little better (that is, the cold medicine kicked in) and so I grabbed a Starbucks and a bagel at a little bagel stand since I hadn't had much lunch.

We hopped back onto the bus for a few stops and got off again at Picadilly Circus and did a little shopping. We bought some items for ourselves and a gift as well. On our way back to the tube to head back to the hotel, we tried to find dinner. We were unsuccessful and so we decided we would just try the restaurant at our hotel. That didn't look good either when we arrive and I was feeling bad again so we ordered room service. It was mediocre and way too expensive, but at least we didn't have to go out into the cold blowing drizzle again.

I ended the evening with a very hot bath before crawling wearily into bed. It was too early to sleep so we watched a DVD on the iBook before going to sleep. (There was nothing on the TV).

Click here for Day 9.