A Taste for Travel

Hi Friends, Bhakti and Jagger here together today!

Happy Valentines Day!

Zach is a great Valentine to Bhakti and got us some delicious strawberry croissant from the airport kiosk. It was a sweet, (see what I did there) way to enjoy the travel day with an eye on the value of our relationship.

We have been practicing cautious traveler behavior in crowded airports and trains using our FAVORITE Airgami masks. They are great quality and stand away from your face to be breathable and roomy, and have great adjustable straps. After the croissant, they even smelled of strawberries too!

Jagger makes the most of these long travel days with his laptop on the floor and a fun new game downloaded and ready to go. He is such a travel trooper and never complains much, even with time changes, weird eating and sleeping schedules, and the constant hurry-up-and-wait pace of it all. We also always draw a lot of attention (usually positive) by finding an unoccupied moving walkway to run, walk backwards, jump and freeze on to get all those wiggles out pre-flight. It usually draws a lot of smiles and giggles and hushed tones of appreciation… and the occasional scowl from a grumpy traveler. But we don’t care, we keep away from others and wait until there’s a lull and then he goes for it at full speed and Bhakti is right in there with him.

Bhakti’s aside: I will admit though, I miss those travel days when he was a baby/toddler when we would pitch our picnic by a window and watch the plane pull up, marveling at the amazing machines, trucks and the hilarious personalities of the ground staff. Now he’s older, it’s a lot of me pointing out cool things and him coming to look (getting my hopes up) then excitedly skipping off to play more video games. Well, I guess whatever works to keep everyone happy is the order of the day on these longer journeys.

We did have a vaguely annoying hiccup already, as the airline decided (despite previous communications) not to send our luggage through to our final destination; but instead to make us pick it up in London before our next flight out. Not that big of a deal, except I certainly would have packed less in our carry-on which contains an overnight bag for us. C’est la vie! More hiccups to come I imagine. Hopefully we will handle them all equally gracefully…. 🤞

We got on the plane and the flight attendant gave us the safety briefing. We were off to London! When we landed, imagine our surprise when we saw a bus where we are used to seeing a walkway. We headed to the bus, through immigration and customs and then got on ANOTHER bus to our hotel. We stayed in a nice hotel with a small room, two beds and recharged our batteries (get it?) for a fun day out.

After the short break, we pushed through the jet lag (though I admit that Jet Lag medication we took on the plane definitely made a difference and we were tired, but still alert enough to enjoy the fun ahead). We used the local for hire car app to get a ride downtown. It was busy, crazy and a tad too fancy for our simple tastes. Still we landed at the most delicious bakery for a coffee and a much needed snack.

Chestnut Bakery, Belgravia was a total hit for all of us. If you find yourself there, get the cinnamon swirl, spanakopita croissant and olive hummus, you can thank us later. We walked the streets and people watched for a bit until it was time to head to Victoria Coach Station.

The building is a great example of the art deco architectural style and has been around since1932. It was a massive structure with a rather large population of… indoor pigeons. Jagger made a fun game of “follow the pigeon” all over the bus station.

The pigeons steered us towards a giant double decker bus, which was our destination, how did they know?! Jagger supposes they must know where all the good food is.

After a short wait, we were invited to board Brigit’s Bakers Afternoon Tea and Bus Tour on recommendation of our friend from the UK, Charlotte. The highlight of the tour for Jagger was probably the cucumber and cream cheese sandwich, “I just ate the best sandwich of my entire life!”. Zach liked the pear tart and Bhakti the choux pastry filled with chocolate hazelnut mousse. But wait a minute, what about the city itself? Zach and Jagger loved Westminster Abby and Bhakti enjoyed the doorman in his full costume waving to our tour and giving a good show of hailing taxis in the busy city. We all enjoyed seeing the FANCIEST Whole Foods EVER and Jagger pointed out some amazing vertical gardens. The tea was so good we could barely finish it all, so we took some away for hotel midnight snacking.

After the tea and tour, we decided it wouldn’t be a trip to London without a ride on the Underground! Jagger hasn’t been on a subway train since his Chicago days and this was an extra fun treat. He decided it would be a good idea to practice his pull-ups on the bar and swing the whole

ride home away.

We may have had only 25 hours (though it felt like longer) in this fun-filled city, but we sure made the most of it, and went back to our hotel beds full of delicious cakes and smiles.

When our original flight connection was canceled resulting in this 25 hour layover, initially it was pretty annoying. We hadn’t planned on a London stop and between transport, hotel, food and an outing (to keep us awake on local time and entertained), it made our travel expenses a lot higher than the original straight-through plan. We embraced it as a part of the adventure and now we’re just so glad it happened. It gave us all a chance to acclimate to certain cultural shifts in a foreign country, without a language barrier. We got comfortable on public transport again and adjusted to the need to take things as they are, in a new place with different ways of doing things. We’re hopeful this little exposure time will help us stay positive and adventurous in a country where we don’t speak the language (Bhakti at all, Jagger a tiny bit and Zach a little more) and the culture is vastly different. Here we go!

Onward to Valencia!