Displaced Beachbums

After a smooth British Airways redeye flight, we arrived in London at 7 am.  Not being one to sleep on a plane, I was very thankful our temporary 2 bedroom/2 bedroom flat was ready for us! The flat is equipped with cable TV, telephone with free calls to the states, kitchen, washer/dryer combo and housekeeping services twice a week.  The location is great ~ right on Baker Street, only two blocks to Regents Park, close to the Baker Street tube station as well as bus stops.

It’s exciting to be living in Europe again.  I prefer to embrace the differences rather than attempt to compare or refer back to how things would be in the states.  I don’t even bother converting the celsius ~ I know 30 is HOT, 20-24 is pleasant and 0 is freezing.  The only item I haven’t found and am missing, is tofu. I’ll start an earnest quest today.

Speaking of food, I was pleased with the Marylebone Farmers Market ( Sundays 10-2).  Found all sorts of yummy items and almost all the fruits and vegetables sold there are organic.  It’ll definitely be a weekly stop after church.

Our first order of business when we arrived was to tour several flats which were available for rent.  At first, we were only interested in 3 bedrooms so we’d have a room for guests but the third room would barely fit a twin bed so it wasn’t going to work for a guest room anyway.  We decided to let a beautiful two bedroom.  Logan has agreed her room will be the guest bedroom when the need arises.  It’s a very private room with its own bathroom.  Perfect for a teenager!  The best part about our new flat ~ location, location, location!  Here’s a photo of the reception room (living room), notice the current tenant’s drying rack. Seems that’s the method of drying clothes since the mini dryers here take forever.  Took us almost 4 hours to do one load of wash the other night.

Being close to Regents Park has a lot of advantages. It’s a great running/walking route for John and I. There’s also an off lease area for Maya ~ not that she’s a dog I’d let off leash very often but maybe early in the morning when no one else is out yet.  And we stumbled onto a Tennis Centre with 12 courts.  No membership required and there are programs for adults/kids/beginners and more experienced players.  It’s only a 10 minute walk from our new flat.  We signed Logan up for the week-long tennis camp. She’ll be there daily from 10 -3 and seemed happy when we dropped her off this morning.  As we were shooed away, we noticed she’d already met another British girl her age.  New friends ~ very exciting.

When we aren’t doing things to get settled, we’re out exploring the city. The tube is so easy to use here in London so we hop on it more often than taking the bus.  Yesterday, we explored the Westminster area: The london eye, Big Ben, Thames River, Millenium Bridge, Trafalgar Square, etc

Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Thames River

John crossing the Millenium Bridge

The Thames River

Big Ben and the River Thames

The London Eye

Big Ben

Her Majesty’s Theater

London Film Museum

Paddington Gardens ~ used to be a church graveyard. Over 80,000 buried in the park.

So much more to see…