Worldcon Trip Day 9: Reykjavik to London
Aug. 2nd, 2024 11:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kevin_standlee[Backdated entry: We've been very busy.]
Our final day in Iceland started with us both waking up earlier than expected.
The third cruise ship in three days in Reykjavik Harbor was the MV Star Pride.
We returned to Apotek for breakfast. It cost more than the other breakfasts while we were here, but not that much, and it proved to be the best overall value. After all, what good is it to spend less on food that you don't like? In any event, we treated this as having a hotel with a discounted rate because their restaurant is closed so they don't include a breakfast, so we had to spend the money elsewhere.
After breakfast, we walked through Parliament Square. That's our hotel up there.
The white building is the City Center Hotel. The next-to-top floor was where we stayed, in the room on the right in this view.
Room 502 gave us good service, and we'd be happy to stay there again. Now Lisa will be staying in this hotel on her return trip from Europe, but she's sharing it with someone else and they'll want one of the two-bed rooms, but otherwise, it was a good room and a friendly, helpful staff.
Behind the Althing is a small park/garden open to the public. Click through to see the other photos. Lisa and I speculate that members of the Althing may stroll around here making deals with fellow members of Iceland's unicameral legislature.
We walked over to the shore of the lake at the center of Reykjavik. On previous trips, we've taken a nice walk around this lake, but we didn't get one this time.
There is a whimsical statue here on the shore of the lake called "The Unknown Bureaucrat."
After our post-breakfast walk it was time to finish packing and move out. Because we got the Saga upgrade, which includes access to the IcelandAir Saga Lounge, I moved up our departure by an hour so we'd have more time in the Lounge. This was a mistake. We ended up getting to Keflavik airport an hour before they started check-in for our flight to London Heathrow, so we just spent the time standing around waiting for check-in to open.
Once we were checked in, we were able to use our Saga status to bypass the longer security queues, but with all of the stuff we were carrying, it still took us a while to get through Terrorization. Not quite as much as in the USA because we didn't have to take off our shoes. Also, there was no room to step out of line and fill up the security bins without holding up other people. However, we made it through.
I normally don't shop in Duty Free, but they had bars of the Icelandic Chocolate that I like and that I normally buy from Cost Plus World Market. They cost around half as much in Duty Free here than they do at Cost Plus, and I bought several. Fingers crossed that I can get them home. Lisa continued through and waited for me beyond. Once I'd made my purchases, Lisa and I headed for the Lounge.
We found a relatively quiet corner of the Saga Lounge.
This large rock dominates the entrance area of the lounge.
There was a pretty decent spread of food and drink on offer
Even Kuma Bear enjoyed the lounge. Here he is contemplating his lunch (tuna) while watching airplanes.
After a couple of pretty peaceful hours in well-fed comfort, it was time to proceed to the gate. In this case, that meant clearing the gate and getting on a bus that transported us to our airplane, where boarded on portable stairs. With Lisa and me being in a pair of Saga class seats, there was no extra seat for Kuma, so he wore this special harness that Lisa made so he couldn't get loose from her.
Saga Class passengers get complimentary noise-canceling headphones. I already had my own, so Kuma gave them a try, but there didn't seem to be any movies about bears or fishes. I was able to watch the final hour of Dune, Part 2 while we ate our in-flight meal, which we'd purchased in advance before we knew we were upgraded.
The flight to Heathrow was comfortable and uneventful, and we arrived at LHR on time. Clearing UK Immigration was painless, and our bags were among the earliest off the belt, presumably due to the Saga upgrade. Then it was time to find our way to the train to London.
I added money to my Oyster card and gave it to Lisa. (She has no credit cards.) I used my Amtrak Guest Rewards credit card, which is contactless, as a tag-in/out card for the train to London. Heathrow Express is very expensive, so we instead took the Elizabeth Line, which costs much less, takes longer, and doesn't have dedicated luggage space or toilets like HEx does.
In retrospect, I might have been happier if we'd spent the £25/person for HEx.
Presently, we arrived at Paddington. From here, we needed to transfer to the Hammersmith & City Tube line toward King's Cross/St. Pancras. Some might wonder why we didn't ride the Elizabeth Line to Farringdon, which is slightly closer to the Crowne Plaza King's Cross. That's because we were carrying a lot of very heavy bags. We were not going to haul those bags over a kilometer from the train station at night over a route we did not know, and Farringdon does not have a taxi rank, so we needed to be somewhere we could get a taxi to the hotel.
Transferring from the Elizabeth Line to the H&C, particularly when you're rolling a bunch of heavy luggage around Paddington Station, proves to be tricky if you're not familiar with the route. The signs seemed to be directing us to all of the other lines, but not the H&C, and we took quite a number of wrong turns before eventually ending up on the Underground train.
Exiting the Underground led to another annoyance: the lift to the St. Pancras end of the station was broken. Lisa got her bag up the stairs, and I as struggled with more than 30 kg of luggage, a nice younger man helped me get the largest of the bags up to the main level.
We got a taxi and £12 later, we were at the Crowne Plaza.
We initially were in a king room, but it was shower stall only, and Lisa wants a bathtub. This was the room we got instead. I'm glad I checked before we carried everything upstairs first.
They were able to get us moved, but it was a smaller bed. Initially, the sofa bed was folded out for some reason, but I folded it away. The room does have a refrigerator and a kettle with a good selection of coffee/tea/cocoa. The work space is better than it was in the City Center, and I can work without blocking Lisa from using the rest of the room.
Lisa did get her bathtub.
After we got into the room, we started unpacking. We discovered that we didn't have enough of the right kinds of plug adapters for both my and Lisa's stuff, given the way the room is laid out. Besides, I was too tired to do computer work. My UK-to-North American outlet went to running my CPAP and (via an extension cord) Lisa's gear.
Both of us were very thirsty but only a little bit hungry. I'd withdrawn £200 at Paddington and gave some of it to Lisa. She went downstairs and to the tiny little store across the street from the hotel, where she got us a selection of sodas, milk, and juice while I started unpacking. She then got minimally unpacked, took a bath, and we both went to bed.
Because of the plug-adapter issues and our fatigue from traveling, I put off writing about today's travel until later.
Our final day in Iceland started with us both waking up earlier than expected.
The third cruise ship in three days in Reykjavik Harbor was the MV Star Pride.
We returned to Apotek for breakfast. It cost more than the other breakfasts while we were here, but not that much, and it proved to be the best overall value. After all, what good is it to spend less on food that you don't like? In any event, we treated this as having a hotel with a discounted rate because their restaurant is closed so they don't include a breakfast, so we had to spend the money elsewhere.
After breakfast, we walked through Parliament Square. That's our hotel up there.
The white building is the City Center Hotel. The next-to-top floor was where we stayed, in the room on the right in this view.
Room 502 gave us good service, and we'd be happy to stay there again. Now Lisa will be staying in this hotel on her return trip from Europe, but she's sharing it with someone else and they'll want one of the two-bed rooms, but otherwise, it was a good room and a friendly, helpful staff.
Behind the Althing is a small park/garden open to the public. Click through to see the other photos. Lisa and I speculate that members of the Althing may stroll around here making deals with fellow members of Iceland's unicameral legislature.
We walked over to the shore of the lake at the center of Reykjavik. On previous trips, we've taken a nice walk around this lake, but we didn't get one this time.
There is a whimsical statue here on the shore of the lake called "The Unknown Bureaucrat."
After our post-breakfast walk it was time to finish packing and move out. Because we got the Saga upgrade, which includes access to the IcelandAir Saga Lounge, I moved up our departure by an hour so we'd have more time in the Lounge. This was a mistake. We ended up getting to Keflavik airport an hour before they started check-in for our flight to London Heathrow, so we just spent the time standing around waiting for check-in to open.
Once we were checked in, we were able to use our Saga status to bypass the longer security queues, but with all of the stuff we were carrying, it still took us a while to get through Terrorization. Not quite as much as in the USA because we didn't have to take off our shoes. Also, there was no room to step out of line and fill up the security bins without holding up other people. However, we made it through.
I normally don't shop in Duty Free, but they had bars of the Icelandic Chocolate that I like and that I normally buy from Cost Plus World Market. They cost around half as much in Duty Free here than they do at Cost Plus, and I bought several. Fingers crossed that I can get them home. Lisa continued through and waited for me beyond. Once I'd made my purchases, Lisa and I headed for the Lounge.
We found a relatively quiet corner of the Saga Lounge.
This large rock dominates the entrance area of the lounge.
There was a pretty decent spread of food and drink on offer
Even Kuma Bear enjoyed the lounge. Here he is contemplating his lunch (tuna) while watching airplanes.
After a couple of pretty peaceful hours in well-fed comfort, it was time to proceed to the gate. In this case, that meant clearing the gate and getting on a bus that transported us to our airplane, where boarded on portable stairs. With Lisa and me being in a pair of Saga class seats, there was no extra seat for Kuma, so he wore this special harness that Lisa made so he couldn't get loose from her.
Saga Class passengers get complimentary noise-canceling headphones. I already had my own, so Kuma gave them a try, but there didn't seem to be any movies about bears or fishes. I was able to watch the final hour of Dune, Part 2 while we ate our in-flight meal, which we'd purchased in advance before we knew we were upgraded.
The flight to Heathrow was comfortable and uneventful, and we arrived at LHR on time. Clearing UK Immigration was painless, and our bags were among the earliest off the belt, presumably due to the Saga upgrade. Then it was time to find our way to the train to London.
I added money to my Oyster card and gave it to Lisa. (She has no credit cards.) I used my Amtrak Guest Rewards credit card, which is contactless, as a tag-in/out card for the train to London. Heathrow Express is very expensive, so we instead took the Elizabeth Line, which costs much less, takes longer, and doesn't have dedicated luggage space or toilets like HEx does.
In retrospect, I might have been happier if we'd spent the £25/person for HEx.
Presently, we arrived at Paddington. From here, we needed to transfer to the Hammersmith & City Tube line toward King's Cross/St. Pancras. Some might wonder why we didn't ride the Elizabeth Line to Farringdon, which is slightly closer to the Crowne Plaza King's Cross. That's because we were carrying a lot of very heavy bags. We were not going to haul those bags over a kilometer from the train station at night over a route we did not know, and Farringdon does not have a taxi rank, so we needed to be somewhere we could get a taxi to the hotel.
Transferring from the Elizabeth Line to the H&C, particularly when you're rolling a bunch of heavy luggage around Paddington Station, proves to be tricky if you're not familiar with the route. The signs seemed to be directing us to all of the other lines, but not the H&C, and we took quite a number of wrong turns before eventually ending up on the Underground train.
Exiting the Underground led to another annoyance: the lift to the St. Pancras end of the station was broken. Lisa got her bag up the stairs, and I as struggled with more than 30 kg of luggage, a nice younger man helped me get the largest of the bags up to the main level.
We got a taxi and £12 later, we were at the Crowne Plaza.
We initially were in a king room, but it was shower stall only, and Lisa wants a bathtub. This was the room we got instead. I'm glad I checked before we carried everything upstairs first.
They were able to get us moved, but it was a smaller bed. Initially, the sofa bed was folded out for some reason, but I folded it away. The room does have a refrigerator and a kettle with a good selection of coffee/tea/cocoa. The work space is better than it was in the City Center, and I can work without blocking Lisa from using the rest of the room.
Lisa did get her bathtub.
After we got into the room, we started unpacking. We discovered that we didn't have enough of the right kinds of plug adapters for both my and Lisa's stuff, given the way the room is laid out. Besides, I was too tired to do computer work. My UK-to-North American outlet went to running my CPAP and (via an extension cord) Lisa's gear.
Both of us were very thirsty but only a little bit hungry. I'd withdrawn £200 at Paddington and gave some of it to Lisa. She went downstairs and to the tiny little store across the street from the hotel, where she got us a selection of sodas, milk, and juice while I started unpacking. She then got minimally unpacked, took a bath, and we both went to bed.
Because of the plug-adapter issues and our fatigue from traveling, I put off writing about today's travel until later.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-03 11:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-08-04 01:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-08-04 05:50 am (UTC)HEX has in-advance fares...
Date: 2024-08-04 10:09 am (UTC)Re: HEX has in-advance fares...
Date: 2024-08-04 06:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-08-04 03:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-08-04 06:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-08-05 04:17 am (UTC)In case anyone reading doesn't know: LHR is served by the Picadilly Line. There's a loop, with stops internal to the airport at Terminals 2&3, Terminal 4, Terminal 5, and Hatton Cross (where the loop closes), and passengers may use this to move around Heathrow. There's an extra Being A Dirty Foreign Traveller fee if you venture out into London (again, not looking up the official name.) However, when approaching LHR Hatton Cross station is also the last station before the airport. The trick is to go to Hatton Cross and stop your first journey there, then start a new journey from Hatton Cross to where you're really going. I'm told this will save a few pounds.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-05 07:41 am (UTC)