Home again - tired but happy

Well to complete the final mini chapter of the trip I should say a few last words now I'm home. After a wonderful time in Leicester on Wednesday I wandered over to Birmingham to hopefully catch the Elite League riders championship. Alas the weather had other ideas, horrible persistent drizzly rain from about 6pm onwards that would not quit. Nothing super heavy, just annoyingly constant and when the water started lying on the track and not draining away we were doomed. Met a lovely chap from Coventry (and his even lovelier daughter) and when the meeting got rained off I gave him my re-admission ticket so he could take someone for free to the restaging of the meeting (when ever that is). Never mind, it was a good excuse for an early night and getting half soaked in a sudden heavy shower on the way back to the hotel wasn't a bad secondary excuse either.

Thursday was a happy / sad day, glad to be going home but sad the trip was coming to an end. Typical English weather as it taunted me with the best day I had encountered since arriving with lovely sunshine just about all day. Caught the train to London (cost 61 quid if you don't mind) and got there mid morning. Thought I should do at least one touristy thing so I caught the tube to Embankment and after queuing for what seemed like hours eventually got to "fly" as the blurb said (which means a slow ride in normal speak) on the London Eye. It looked great from the ground but somehow felt a bit flat while I was up there and while it was happening. perhaps the long wait had dulled my enthusiasm for it. Finally escaped the hordes of marauding tourists and found a pub for lunch (strange how that kept happening) and settled down for an hour or so with a fish and chips interlude to help me fight the hunger pains.

Had a very zigzaggy walk down the Thames past the Houses of Commons / Big Ben, Lambeth Palace etc only to wonder what was next to kill a few hours. I then remembered that the Oval cricket ground wasn't too far away so I did some more more meandering till I had success and found it hiding behind some blocks of flats. As luck would have it a game was going on between Surrey and Sussex and I got to see a couple of hours of Sussex starting their first innings chasing 450 odd and at the rate they were going it was going to take them a very long time to catch it. Met three super blokes who I'll call "Nigel and the lads". All obviously well educated and loved their cricket and after me making a few comments about their beer looking terrible and owning up to being an uneducated colonial we had a nice time swapping stories and banter in between the overs and before stumps were drawn sometime after six. I happened to mention I was killing time and got a response "I can't think of a better way to kill time to be honest". A nice relaxing interlude in the sun and I even had some cake and biscuits forced upon me by Nigel and his mates. Absolutely smashing blokes all three of them. Those two hours summed up the trip for me, everywhere I went I met some lovely people and that was a really nice thing when all we seem to read in the papers is all the bad things and awful people in life.

The other good thing was it had taken me past most of the main peak hour rush so all that remained was to head back to Euston, pick up my backpack from left luggage and fight my way across town on the tube to Heathrow. More waiting around (how many hours did I spend doing that over the holiday ?) and then safely on the plane home. Apart from a slightly upset tummy and a window seat (and does that ever upset the people in your row who are trying to sleep) it was largely uneventful and boring trip home, although thinking about the good times I had encountered was a nice thing to exercise my mind on.

Have resolved to do it all again in the next year or two but take more time, take it slower and book everything in advance. I'm sure there are huge savings to be made on public transport and with accommodation if you take the time to research it and know how the land lies. Now that I know I'll be better prepared for the next one. More nice people to catch up with (and hopefully a few very nice ones to catch up with again) and I can't wait !!