Globetrotting: to Disneyland Paris and back with TCD

[CCIntrigue...aka Gwen 547]

 

I really hate shopping and stores, and I especially hate to go shopping with a woman (no offense to any female readers). 

 

TCD

 

I hate to go shopping too, and it's even worse with other women!  I only shop when I need something specific, and I'm in and out of the average store in under five minutes.  My mother and my daughter, on the other hand, look at every single item in every store, even if it's the wrong size.  Arrrgh ...

 

More great pictures.  London looks like such an interesting, beautiful city to visit.

[ependydad...Doug 176]

I guess since she knew I was waiting, DD did not take too long shopping, and we met up outside of the shop.

 

We took the Tube back to our hotel to give our feet a rest.  I took this photo of one of the many ads we saw for Las Vegas, of all places:

 

 

That's no joke. I like the English Mum's that I hear around Disney World. In all of my time, I just want to hear one of them lose their stuff in a string of obscenities. My life would then be complete. :) My wife, however, thinks that I'm "stupid".

 

That shopping sounds terrible but it sounds like your daughter was courteous of you.

[Travisma 1,317]

I hate to go shopping too, and it's even worse with other women!  I only shop when I need something specific, and I'm in and out of the average store in under five minutes.  My mother and my daughter, on the other hand, look at every single item in every store, even if it's the wrong size.  Arrrgh ...

 

More great pictures.  London looks like such an interesting, beautiful city to visit.

I don't mind shopping, as long as it's a Goodwill, DollarTree, yardsale, or Aldi.

[Dalspot ... Karen 21]

The design detail on old buildings never ceases to awe me.  To think that it was all done by hand is amazing.

 

 

 

 

Here's some old building that was in the area.  Sorry, but I didn't catch its name.  It looks cool, though:

 

 

[Travisma 1,317]

I'm waiting patiently to see if you visited a certain spot in London.....

[PrincessE'sMama 6]

Looking forward to the next update.  I was so excited to shop at Harrods but was totally overwhelmed when we got there.  We found the Christmas section and purchased an ornament and a nutcracker so all was not lost.  And we saw Rod Stewart so that was a bonus!

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I hate to go shopping too, and it's even worse with other women!  I only shop when I need something specific, and I'm in and out of the average store in under five minutes.  My mother and my daughter, on the other hand, look at every single item in every store, even if it's the wrong size.  Arrrgh ...

 

More great pictures.  London looks like such an interesting, beautiful city to visit.

 

Hmmm.  That is very odd.  Maybe you are really a man trapped in a woman's body?

 

London ended up being much more beautiful and interesting than I expected.  The nice weather we enjoyed helped, I'm sure.

 

That's no joke. I like the English Mum's that I hear around Disney World. In all of my time, I just want to hear one of them lose their stuff in a string of obscenities. My life would then be complete. :) My wife, however, thinks that I'm "stupid".

 

That shopping sounds terrible but it sounds like your daughter was courteous of you.

 

Your wife is right.

 

As usual.

 

The shopping wasn't bad at all.  There was some good people watching as I waited.

 

I don't mind shopping, as long as it's a Goodwill, DollarTree, yardsale, or Aldi.

 

Hmmm.  Maybe I should try those places.

 

I do enjoy a trip to Home Depot or Ace Hardware.

 

The design detail on old buildings never ceases to awe me.  To think that it was all done by hand is amazing.

 

So true.  It's amazing how much trouble they went to in including all the ornate detail that we see.  That kind of stuff just doesn't happen today.

 

I'm waiting patiently to see if you visited a certain spot in London.....

 

Now you have me wondering where you might be thinking of.

 

If it's Harry Potter's house, or anything to do with wizards, then you are going to be disappointed.

 

Looking forward to the next update.  I was so excited to shop at Harrods but was totally overwhelmed when we got there.  We found the Christmas section and purchased an ornament and a nutcracker so all was not lost.  And we saw Rod Stewart so that was a bonus!

 

I didn't know what to expect at Harrod's.  I've been to big department stores in NYC, Philly and San Francisco, so I thought it would be along those lines.

 

I guess we were lucky and Rod Stewart wasn't shopping when we went.

 

TCD

[CCIntrigue...aka Gwen 547]

Hmmm.  That is very odd.  Maybe you are really a man trapped in a woman's body?

 

 

TCD

 

I am NOT Bruce Jenner!

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I am NOT Bruce Jenner!

 

Hey show some respect to Caitlin.

 

TCD

[Santa ... Shannon 160]

Who are we supposed to feel bad for, Caitlin or Bruce, when he/she realizes that he/she is trapped in neither a man's nor a woman's body?

[Northerngirl--Lori 5]

I can't wait to go into Harrods!! Hurry back with the next update!!

[caveat lector 181]

Geez, look at all the people walking around in the middle of the day. Is there anybody working on Friday in London? Looks like a day at Epcot during food and wine.

Nice DDBS btw. (Double decker bus selfie)

[fortpartyof4 108]

It is comforting to me that even though I have been gone from FF a lot, and have missed out on so much, your selfies still suck.  The familiarity of it makes me feel right at home.

 

Carry on.

[lightbikes 73]

Loved Harrods - did you get to the Food Court area??   When we were there years ago it was amazing

[BradyBzLyn...Mo 2,023]

Great photo tour of the city!  I love that the different parts of the city all have their own personalities.

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

Who are we supposed to feel bad for, Caitlin or Bruce, when he/she realizes that he/she is trapped in neither a man's nor a woman's body?

 

Things that make you say Hmmmm? These are strange times we're living in.

 

But, I think that's enough talk about this topic, and it's best that we move along.

 

I can't wait to go into Harrods!! Hurry back with the next update!!

 

I will be working on that next!

 

Geez, look at all the people walking around in the middle of the day. Is there anybody working on Friday in London? Looks like a day at Epcot during food and wine.

Nice DDBS btw. (Double decker bus selfie)

 

You know what?

 

I goofed.

 

That was a Saturday afternoon, not a Friday.  This kept on happening on the trip- I never adjusted to the fact that we lost a day when we flew over and arrived on a Wednesday morning.   In my mind, it was still Tuesday, and I never did get it straight.

 

I am glad that you appreciated the selfie.  Unlike some people (see below).

 

It is comforting to me that even though I have been gone from FF a lot, and have missed out on so much, your selfies still suck.  The familiarity of it makes me feel right at home.

 

Carry on.

 

Wow.

 

So, we haven't seen a post from you around here in quite a while, and you have to come on here and bust my chops about my selfie skills?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good job.

 

Hope all is well with you and the boys.

 

Loved Harrods - did you get to the Food Court area??   When we were there years ago it was amazing

 

Sadly, I only heard about the Food Court after our visit there.  I never saw it.  Which isn't hard to believe considering the size of that place.

 

Great photo tour of the city!  I love that the different parts of the city all have their own personalities.

 

It's really true, and I would like to spend some more time on a future visit visiting the different areas of the city.

 

TCD

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

Picking up where the last update ended, we caught another Double Decker bus west, on our way to find Harrods.

 

We passed by Hyde Park, which looked really nice.  I had wanted to actually visit the park, but this is as close as we got:

 

 

The area around Hyde Park is very nice.  Swanky even:

 

 

There's a bunch more bicyclists over there.  I think biking around in groups must be a thing in European cities.  I saw it several times.  I think it's crazy:

 

 

We reached the appropriate bus stop, and headed down and out of the bus.  Here, we are heading down the street to Harrod's, which is that huge building you see straight ahead:

 

 

Here's one more look at where we're heading- don't be distracted by the taxi with the Heineken ad- you can see the Harrod's sign on the side of the corner of the building up there on the left:

 

 

As we headed down the street,  we remembered there was a photo op that we had not yet participated in.  Done:

 

 

We then headed on to Harrod's.

 

Goodness, it's huge.

 

I thought it was bigger than the Macy's in NYC, but apparently it's not.  It sure seemed like it was.

 

DD looked at a few things, and then asked if we could go to a café in the store that she had heard about.

 

We found it.

 

Their specialty is macarons:

 

 

We purchased a small selection.

 

My favorite were the salted caramel ones.

 

Wow.

 

They had a bunch of other desserts available too:

 

 

We saw a sign that provided directions to the Disney store and café.  I remember hearing that there was a Disney Store in Harrod's.  Since we're Disney people, we had to check it out.

 

We passed through the children's department on the way, and saw this display:

 

 

That brings up a good point.  This ended up being the only thing we saw in London that made any reference to the new princess.   From all the hype in the US media, I was expecting a lot more.  It ends up that I think the US media cares more about the doings of the royals than the British people do.

 

We found the Disney store.

 

They had the same stuff that Disney stores in the US have:

 

 

Except that they did have a Royal Guard Mickey:

 

 

And a Beefeater Mickey:

 

 

And exclusive Harrod's Minnie ears:

 

 

(we got DD a set of those to wear in Disneyland Paris).

 

Donald got the Brit treatment too:

 

 

This Hulk was pretty cool, and very big:

 

 

They had plenty of expensive princess dresses:

 

 

We also saw a sign pointing to a Disney Café.  We wanted to check that out, but it was closed:

 

 

Looking at the menu, it was a place we might have liked to try:

 

 

Here's a couple of zooms on the menu so you can see the descriptions and the prices:

 

 

 

This is a good place to talk about European money.  I thought it would be hard, but if you let your credit card company know you're going, it's not really a big deal at all.  You can charge Euros or Pounds on the card, and the credit card company will convert that to dollars so you can pay it.  We also purchased a bit of currency before we left, and that was easy to spend.

 

It ended up that we picked a good time to visit.  The exchange rate for both the Euro and Pound are much better this year, than they were last year.

 

If we had been about a month earlier, it would have been even better:

 

 

Basically, if you multiply a pound by 1.5, that tells you how much something costs in dollars.

 

So, those items you see on the menu that cost 9.95 pounds would be about $15.26, and something that costs 12.00 pounds would be about $18.41.  The prices were high, but I imagine that they're comparable to what you would pay for a similar meal in a major US city.

 

We poked around Harrods some more.  It was amazing how much stuff they had, and even more amazing how much it cost.

 

Once again, things must be very good with the economy in London.

 

From here, we decided to head out and find a place to eat.

 

We took the Tube from an entrance that was close by, and then switched trains so we could get on the line that went to the stop near our hotel.

 

This tube stop was outside, and had a little garden:

 

 

Whoever was responsible for the gardening should have cleaned up the mess on the other side of the tracks:

 

 

There were apartment buildings all around this open train platform.  I tried to imagine what it must be like to live in an apartment (I mean flat) in London.  But, I really can't imagine what it would be like.  Very different from my life, that's for sure.

 

The train that showed up to take us back was a new, articulated, train, where there were no walls between the train cars.  That was pretty cool:

 

 

We found another pub for dinner that night, but my camera batteries were dead at this point.  We both had a chicken dish.  Still no fish and chips for me.

 

This was our last night in London, as we were catching the train in the morning to Disneyland Paris.

 

I never did find a fish and chips stand where they serve the food in sheets of newspaper the way they do in Epcot.  I'm sure such places must exist, but I never saw one.

 

We ended Day 4 back at the hotel a bit late.  We got our stuff packed up, as we planned to head out by a bit past 7.  We had a train to catch, and we didn't want to be late.

 

Day 5 arrived, and we had no problem waking up and getting going.  The sun rises early in London. 

 

This is the view outside our hotel window.  There was construction going on out there, but the workers only showed up after 9 am, and were done by 4 pm each day.  No one was out there working on this Sunday morning:

 

 

The building over there across the courtyard must be condos.  That wouldn't be a bad place to live:

 

 

This is the view down the street toward the street our hotel was on.  If you took a left at the green light you see there, that's the street our hotel was on:

 

 

In case you didn't notice, we're walking to the Tube station to catch the train to the station where we will get the Eurostar train to France.

 

This is the intersection where the Tube station was.  It was much nicer weather this morning than it had been the day we arrived:

 

 

That sign there marks the entrance to our station:

 

 

It ended up that where we stayed made it really convenient to get to the St. Pancras station, which is where we needed to go.  Just five stops on this line, and we'd be there:

 

 

Next up- We're going to Disneyland! (Paris)

 

TCD

[DaveInTN 3,247]

I wonder if that Disney Cafe at Harrods serves the same crappy counter service stuff that they do at WDW?  And if they take the DDP?

[Momof6....aka Marty 769]

Next time, you should try to be in London for all day Sunday.  You can catch a bus to Speaker's Corner in Hyde Park and listen to all the fun there.  :D

[dvccamper 32]

That train looks super clean. I realize you said it was new but were all the trains you rode in clean like that?

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I wonder if that Disney Cafe at Harrods serves the same crappy counter service stuff that they do at WDW?  And if they take the DDP?

 

It's hard to say, but to the best of my recollection, I've never seen Breaded Cod Goujons or Crispy Dingly Dell Farm Bacon on any WDW quick serve menu, so I'm going to go with no.

 

Next time, you should try to be in London for all day Sunday.  You can catch a bus to Speaker's Corner in Hyde Park and listen to all the fun there.   :D

 

The Speaker's Corner?  Never heard of it.  Something for me to look forward to for the next visit, I guess.

 

That train looks super clean. I realize you said it was new but were all the trains you rode in clean like that?

 

That new train was super clean.  But, even the older ones weren't too shabby.  London seemed like a pretty clean place, in general.  But then again, so did Dublin.  Paris was another matter, but we will get to that later.

 

TCD

[fortpartyof4 108]

 

 

 

Wow.

 

So, we haven't seen a post from you around here in quite a while, and you have to come on here and bust my chops about my selfie skills?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good job.

 

Hope all is well with you and the boys.

 

 

 

 

It's "middle school mentality" - if I pick on you, in means I like you.

 

I spend a lot of time with kids that age.  I guess it rubs off on you.

 

Besides, would you rather I ruin your reputation by revealing how kind-hearted and sweet you are?

 

Oops - I just did :)

 

We are well, thank you - so crazy busy I am pretty sure we have lost our minds, but enjoying the ride!

[Momof6....aka Marty 769]

 

The Speaker's Corner?  Never heard of it.  Something for me to look forward to for the next visit, I guess.

 

It's kind of like a live version of the Debate Board.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speakers'_Corner

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

It's "middle school mentality" - if I pick on you, in means I like you.

 

I spend a lot of time with kids that age.  I guess it rubs off on you.

 

Besides, would you rather I ruin your reputation by revealing how kind-hearted and sweet you are?

 

Oops - I just did :)

 

We are well, thank you - so crazy busy I am pretty sure we have lost our minds, but enjoying the ride!

 

No worries.  Plus, the sad fact is that I cannot take a good selfie.

 

Glad that all is well with you.  Hope that y'all have a great summer.

 

It's kind of like a live version of the Debate Board.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speakers'_Corner

 

That actually sounds pretty fun.  Kind of like the Plaza of the Americas at UF (DIT knows what I'm talking about).

 

TCD

[CCIntrigue...aka Gwen 547]

I was in a Disney store in Charlotte today and they had very little adult merchandise -- just one table of T-shirts.  Was it the same at Harrods?