the london bridge

...is apparently NOT falling down, no matter how many times you sing that song. in fact, it's pretty solid at the moment - and yes, i checked this out personally.

sorry for takin so long to update this thing, apparently finding places in london where i can download my pics isn't as easy as i thought. although, admittedly, my mind has been elsewhere... most of you may not know, but my plan was to fly over to brussels and then take a train to a nearby airport (yes a different one than where nwa lands, but it was good deal cheaper) and jump on a plane to london in the afternoon. gettin me in the land of beafeaters and beer by dinner time.

so my journey began with what appeared to be a good deal. nwa overbooked my flight to brussels and was handing out $750 travel vouchers to anyone who could bump their schedule a bit. i went up there and had them fly me directly to london instead (for those of you keeping score at home, that's $750 extra, non-stop flight to actual destination and arriving a solid 10 hours early - note to novice travelers: take the money, ALWAYS take the money). what's easier than that? but this trip couldn't begin with everything goin my way, of course not, it wouldn't make sense. after waiting for a solid 30min at the luggage carousel i realized that my bag didn't make the flight. i submitted a claim asking them to drop it off at the hotel when it arrived. fast forward to monday and i still don't have my luggage. don't worry, they let me buy some clothes on them, so i got that goin for me... which is nice.

see joe travel. see joe travel without luggage.

so one of the first things i noticed on this dyslexic island community is that they drive on the wrong side, now i knew this going in but it's still strange to see. it's also weird to cross the street, i was always taught to look left, then right, then left again when crossing busy streets. you gotta do it the other way over here, not a big deal but a little unnerving when you do it the wrong way and almost get run over.

so i've found my way in and about london without getting lost, apparently JoePS works in london too (for those of you scoring at home, that's the contiguous 48 states (except ski slopes in lake tahoe), mexico, sao paolo and now london). i'm stayin in a nice area just a big north of the river and all the attractions. they've got some pretty decent shops and a LOT of touristy junk out here. you know, for a country that lent it's name to our language, surprisingly not that many people on the street speak it. i'd venture to guess that less than 50% of the coversations i hear as i pass people on the street are not english. i guess that kinda also might correlate with the fact that my hotel is the london headquarters for contiki tours (fyi: it's a travel coordinating company that takes a bunch of lone travelers and makes it a group). which is apparently quite popular with continental euros and americans who've just graduated (both college and high school).

beisdes all that, it's been raining quite a lot here - SHOCKER. i'll keep you posted in the next city. oh, a few housekeeping notes: i've decided to add to my running themes subplot on the side. i'm almost certain that in every country i've ever been to i've had pizza. my aim for this trip is to have a pizza at every stop. shouldn't be too hard. the other new one is that i'm goin to have a taste of a local brew in every country (it'd be too hard to find one for each city).