Discovering Lost Time

Michael's plane was supposed to arrive at Heathrow around noon, so Alex and I took it easy at the hostel until around then, blogging and catching up with photos and all that. There was a very nice lady native to London who was working at the hostel and she gave us some suggestions of things to do, one of which was to take the ferry to Greenwich. Around noon, upon realizing that we'd have an additional hour to wait while MIchael took the tube from Heathrow to Lambeth, Alex and I set off with another all-day tube pass to the Embankment pier to check out the prices of the ferry. It was pretty cheap, around 3 or 4 quid each way, so we decided to take Michael on it later. We also walked around Embankment/Waterloo to scout for a place to eat. The area turned out to be pretty cool, with lots of businessmen walking to the many restaurants in the area. Too bad all those places were way out of our price range. Average cost of a hamburger was $10! And that was average. We ended up finding this little out-of-the-way pub called "A Hole in the Wall" where the prices were just right.

After our find, Alex and I strolled back to the tube and waited outside the Lambeth station for Michael. When he arrived, we were all very happy to see each other and chatted with much intensity on the walk back to the hostel. When we got back there, we let Michael get settled, and then we headed back to Embankment for lunch.

By this time it was around 2:30 or 3 in the afternoon. Apparently all the restaurants and pubs stop serving food and keep only their bars open until dinnertime, so scratch A Hole in the Wall off the list of places to eat. We did, however, get some tasty beers. I tried a light Belgian ale called Leffe and it was beyond fantastic. I'll have to remember that one for the States.

After our beers (and lack of lunch) I must say I was feeling pretty silly. But I blame that on the whole no-food thing! I'm not that much of a lightweight. We headed back to the pier and took the Thames ferry to Greenwich, a trip that took around an hour. It was very comfortable, though, complete with air conditioning and spacious leather seats. Upon arrival, we did a lot of walking around the beautiful little town. Most of our time we spent in the park, and we eventually arrived at the Royal Observatory where sits the Prime Meridian of the world, separating the eastern from the western hemisphere as well as British Standard Time (BST) from Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). It was kind of neat to straddle that line.

After the museum, we continued walking around the Royal Gardens and down some of the side streets behind the park. We found a very comfortable wrought iron bench and sat there for a while relaxing and watching people bike up and down the massive hill. We headed back into the main town of Greenwich and found the main drag as well as the elusive pear juice Alex and I had been looking everywhere for since day one. It was every bit as delicious as we had imagined. Just think about drinking a fresh pear and you'll know exactly how delicious this was. We even stumbled upon the set for a movie! At the Royal Naval College there was a huge set and tons of cast and crew decked out in medieval costume while filming a feature-length version of  Gulliver's Travels. It was prety cool to see everyone dressed like talking and taking naps in the field.

Back at the hostel, we were challenged to a game of good old fashioned beer pong by an already-saucy Australian guy. There was a group of Canadians (from Vancouver) as well, so the game became Yanks vs. Canucks. There were a lot of strange rules (such as the no airball rule, or the strange rendition of rock-paper-scissors that involved a ninja, a hunter, and a bear). The game was really close; we both had 1 cup left, but Michael and I lost at the rebuttal.

Another long, fun day well spent!