Just in

Arrived in London Gatwick airport today a little after 10:00 AM London time (5 hours difference). The plane ride went well but hard to sleep to much on the plane especially with an occasional crying child.

We were real impressed with the Detroit airport. It had been awhile since I flew through it and they have really fixed it up.

Took the Gatwick Express train from the airport. Yesterday bought a round trip pass on the internet so only had to show them our confirmation number on the train. The train is 30 minutes and the scenery is nothing too special along the way. One thing we did notice is they seem to love the art of graffiti - seemed to be all over the place.

Once we made it to Victoria station we decided to take the tube to the area of London where the hotel is located. Asked two different people of the best way to get to Old Street tube stop and got two different answers. Turns out both would have worked, just a different stop to change lines. We took the Victoria line to Euston and then switched to the Northern line to get to Old Street. Here is a link to the Tube Map. Once I got connected to the internet found this site to help plan tube trips.

We saw a lot of advertising for plays in the area or coming such as Mama Mia, The Producers, Lion Kinge, Evita, Mary Poppins, etc.

Once we made it to Old Street we needed to find the hotel which is on Great Eastern street. I could tell from the map it is close to the tube stop but when we got up from the underground I could not quite get my bearings. I could not see any street signs so I made a logical guess and we walked a couple of blocks then decided to ask a guy we saw - a little weary at this time. He said he used to live in London so he tried to help. I did not feel too bad at this point since he also could not find a street sign - then he found it. Guess where - on a building on the third floor. So that gave the bearings I needed to find Great Eastern and then quickly found the hotel, which is only about 3 blocks from the Old Street stop.

Mom is taking a twenty minute nap - she said to not let it go longer, then we will probably get a bite to eat [our eating schedule is a bit messed up - dinner on the plane at around 11:30 PM and breakfast at about 8:00 AM London time which was 3:00 AM NC time; last time we compare times]. It is now about 1:30 PM so need to wake up Mom.