After our long sit in the Frankfurt lounge, we headed to Glasgow via Lufthansa. Easy flight. More food.
We went through customs. I managed to do the wrong thing on the scanner — I think I scanned the wrong page of my passport! — and had to see a person instead. He asked me where I came from. I said California. Heh. Then he said, “No, where did you just fly in from?” Oh. Right. Frankfurt! Old Brain!
From there it was collection luggage time. I think our bags were maybe the 2nd and 3rd out! Dan didn’t recognize his but thankfully I said, “But isn’t that yours?” and he quickly went after it.
Our hotel (Holiday Inn) is directly across the street from the airport. As in about a three minute walk, max. So we are now in our room and we will see how we sleep tonight. It does feel like it’s night to me, although not quite 11:55, as the clock says. We have, um, quite the view … of a parking garage!
First of all, in case anyone is reading … yes, we heard back from the final restaurant and yes, our table is booked. So we have everything set for our Great Glen Way walk, aside from the one place that is walk in only. I trust we’ll manage to make that one work: it’s certainly nothing worth worrying about.
Someone on Facebook (there is a Great Glen Way group) wrote to say some routes on the Great Glen Way have been closed, so I’ll be curious to see how we are rerouted and how many more miles we end up walking due to that. But what’s a few more miles, right? Perhaps our packet from Mickledore will even fill us in on all of that. Sadly, it’s yet to arrive! They had warned us that it could be FOUR weeks after sending it that it would land in our mailbox. Ah, snail mail! Getting more “snailish” all the time, I guess.
I heard back from one (Rick Steves recommended) B&B (in York) this past week. Turns out the place next to them has sold and there is major renovation going on. I hated saying goodbye to the place (it’s called the Bronte Guest House and doesn’t that sound great?), but if we are paying for something I think we need to get something that doesn’t drive us bonkers with noise, so we had to move. So it goes. Still, I will hope that, should we ever return, we will book with them. I’m sorry they are dealing with this issue, but I greatly appreciate them contacting us about it.
Ch-ch-ch-changes. If one is a traveler one must accept those and not stress. Right?!
My phone now informs me that we leave in 23 days. This means it’s definitely time to see what clothing I’ll bring and if I need to get anything else, since so much has to be ordered online these days. I try so hard to shop local, but stores are carrying less and less. I already have a pair of sandals coming. (What?! Sandals for the UK? What about rain. Yeah … I know ….)
Side Note: I have this awful tendency to want to have something new for a trip. This is absolutely ridiculous and I wish I could rid myself of the bad habit. So will I? Hmm. Stay tuned ….
BUT, regarding clothing … who knows what the weather will be like? Someone wrote to say that they did the GGW (see how savvy I am? I am now calling the Great Glen Way the GGW. Yep, I’m that cool.) last May and it was HOT. Now keep in mind “hot” is a relative term, but if the temp is 60° or higher it can really feel hot if you’re walking a lot. Trust me. I know. I’ll be checking weather eventually, but it’s simply too soon to bother now.
So either tomorrow or Tuesday I will be getting things out and seeing if I have things that will work. As any reader knows, we attempt to travel light, and that means clothes must all coordinate so I can mix and match. Easy to do, really.
Oh … and I have been wearing the shoes I’ll take on the Great Glen Way to make certain they work. So far, so good!
The other thing I’ve now done is purchase our “Two Together” train pass. This is a pass that makes our train trips much less expensive. It requires us to travel together (not a problem) and requires, as well, that it is always the two of us, so I can’t switch partners. Um. I think that works just fine.
Okay, this is enough of me for now. I hope this is all readable. I just finished with a week of opera and my brain is entirely fried.
Trains are done, although we still need to get our “Two Together Railcard” which is good for a year. When I purchased the train tickets I included that card on the order which lowers the price significantly. I don’t have to purchase the card quite yet, so I am holding off, in case we visit the UK again within the year. It just might be used for more than this trip if that’s the case, and who knows?
Travel insurance is purchased. It’s a requirement for the walking portion of our trip, but it’s also just a wise thing to get and something we never bought before because we were simply unaware. Our credit card covers things like lost luggage and trip cancellation, but getting coverage for things like medical and evacuation is pretty important should we have an unfortunate incident.
AND our Mickeldore packet is available online so I can see where we are staying! That was fun to receive. It makes the trip all the more real.
Next up is figuring out places to eat while on our walk. I’ve read that getting reservations is recommended and I sure do want to be certain we have places to eat after a walking day.
Then it’s “do we want to schedule any visits?” There are distilleries we can check out, and of course there are some castles. I know we’ll want to see Stirling Castle, and I’m assuming we will also want to visit Edinburgh Castle. Might there be a concert somewhere? Have to check! Is there a pub that will have live music that would be fun to hear? Possibly. So more research is necessary.
Oh … and one other thing. I’m a bit obsessive (can you tell?) so I check our United seats pretty much daily. One leg seated us pretty far back so I was hoping for a change. Well, there WAS a change on one leg … a change of plane, which then put us in seats we didn’t want! Apparently United does this without notifying the ticket holders. I find that so odd. Thankfully I could move us to seats we preferred and take care of that issue. But honestly … shouldn’t they notify ticket holders who are paying SO DOGGONE MUCH for seats?! I’ve since been informed (from a United group) that others have had the same problem, and that sometimes they even separate a couple. One man said his seats were changed the day of his trip. So I guess checking is helpful, but until we are IN our seats there are no guarantees!
Okay, so really the trip to the UK is just one trip — and what feels like a short one at that! But it also feels like we have to plan for two trips: obviously there’s the Walking Portion, and then there’s the Rest ‘o The days.
While we are on the walk we have to be prepared for, as one person put it, all four seasons in one day. I doubt very much that will actually happen, but certainly we have to be well prepared for rain. Sadly we also have to prepare for midges. Those are pesky tiny flies that bite. They don’t carry diseases like the mosquito, but I hear they are a terrible nuisance. I’m hoping they hatch later this year and maybe we’ll avoid them, since May is only the start of their pesky lives. We also have to bring trekking poles.
Guess what isn’t allowed in carryon luggage?!
Yep, no poles.
Now some people on various message boards have said they brought them on the plane with no problem at all. Fine. But what if there is a problem and the confiscate them? We are out some rather expensive poles. Others said they ordered cheap poles from Amazon and had them delivered to their first hotel prior to the walk. We are attempting (though not always succeeding) in avoiding Amazon if possible, as so many local stores are failing and I’m pretty darn sure Amazon is part of the reason. In addition, there’s a possibility that the order doesn’t arrive. Who needs that worry? So we will have to check a bag this time. But so it goes. It’s not a huge deal, although we do have a plane transfer so any vital stuff will be in our carryon bags.
We are also doing things that require clothing that is a bit less “rugged”. I already have one reservation for a restaurant in London that does require nicer dressing. So while we have to walking clothes we do have to think about being presentable at places like this restaurant … and maybe a concert if I can find one we want to attend. Time will tell. My hope is that I can still get away with just my boots for the walk and one other pair of shoes. I think it’s possible, but we’ll see.
I’ve already started my mental packing, but I will probably start a written list soon. I use Numbers for all of this: the itinerary, reservations and all pertinent information, possible things to do in each city, and of course the packing list. A couple I follow online both at their website and on YouTube said it’s very handy to have the itinerary and reservations easily accessible so that when you go through customs and are asked for an address you can easily find the first hotel. I’d not thought of that before, but I’ve always had my spreadsheets in any case.
About the Retirement Travelers: They, John and Bev, are such fun to follow, by the way: they sold everything and are doing the full time traveling bit while they are able. I think that sounds absolutely fantastic! And yes, they only do carryon as well. Check ‘em out!
No pictures yet … I’ll post them when we get closer to the trip to show what I have decided to pack. (Not that I won’t change my mind seconds before we head out the door!) We still have a whopping 108 days before our departure date, and I have three symphony sets, two opera runs, and a movie to play, along with teaching my students.
I probably mentioned this when I was working on The Big Trip, but finding lodging sure is a challenge … and a game.
I had everything booked for this upcoming trip. I do this task by first putting a spreadsheet together. I compare booking directly (which I prefer), to Expedia, Booking.com, and United’s hotel link. I also look at Trip Advisor to see how a place is rated there. I now also look at Oyster.com to see what they have to say.
I then look at a map to see how far the place is from the Center Of Things and any places we must visit, as well as from whatever transportation we will be using in and out of the city.
And I did all that. I was slightly uncomfortable with a couple of places, but I booked something just to make sure we wouldn’t be stranded with no place to sleep.
Then I step away from the computer. This time I did so for … well … maybe 12 hours or so.
And then I go back, because I think, “Hm. Can I do better?!” And today I could. I had already canceled a B&B that made me just a bit concerned: it seemed a bit too difficult to get to (they said not to follow the GPS) and possibly too many stairs for lugging luggage (gee, those two words are obviously related, yes? How did I not think of that before?). I found a better hotel, and was going to book it directly, but thought I should probably check Expedia as well (even though I really dislike using a service … money is money), remembering that on the phone you get more points or whatever it is they give you AND sometimes there is even a price difference compared to the web. Sure enough, it was less — over $100 less than I had expected to pay.
But it’s dominoes, folks.
Since I did that I thought, “I wonder if the next hotel I booked is cheaper that way as well?”
Yep. $165 cheaper in fact. (Still doggone expensive. but that’s the UK for you.)
Now that I’ve gone down the rabbit hole I’ll probably end up looking at ALL the other places I’ve booked to see if I can do better with those as well.
