It's Not An Adventure Unless....

“It’s not an adventure unless things don’t go right” - Jon Ingalls

Jon had planned on us flying to London May 31 on an 11 am  flight which would get us into London with a afternoon and evening to look around. When he tried to do a flight check-in on his computer, the British Airways flight had been cancelled!! After a few moments of high anxiety, he managed to get us two seats on a 7 am flight which meant getting up at 4:30 am in order to dress, pack up, drive to the airport, turn in the rental car, and go through security at Inverness airport. By the time he had done a dry-run to the airport, just to be sure we would not get lost on the way in the morning, and got to bed, I don’t think he got more than 4 hours sleep, if that much. But we got to the airport in good time the next morning and without coffee, imagine that! The store at the small airport did not open for another 15 minutes. Coffee was his first priority. I munched on a half banana I had in my pack.

He called the hotel in London to explain what happened and to ask them to hold us an earlier room if one became available. At the London airport, it was raining; we deplaned in the rain and hurried to a shuttle bus that took us to the air terminal. When we collected our luggage, mine was pretty wet on one side. We had a croissant and more coffee there and then took a train to Briars Wood station. Using the app on his phone, Jon had figured it was a nine minute walk from the train to the hotel. I had an umbrella; Jon insisted on towing both suitcases. In one place we could not avoid water pooling in a sidewalk depression. I was glad that I had water proofed my shoes before I left home. Even though water wet the bottom of my slacks, hardly any water at all got into my shoes. My umbrella kept my backpack dry. 

We were in luck, the hotel clerk told us. They had just one room ready that was like the one Jon had reserved. I checked on my luggage right away but evidently not enough water had leaked through, at least not through the lining. We had lunch at the hotel; it was too late for breakfast by the time we got there. We looked at our options, decided to conserve our energy and take a taxi to Madame Toussants Wax Museum. The taxi would only take cash and Jon asked how much it would cost. It depended on the traffic: 17-18 ₤. Traffic was very bad; when the meter read 19 ₤,  we got out as Jon only had 20 ₤ cash on him. We walked the rest of the way, maybe a half hour walk and as we approached the place, Jon said oh, no. There was a lo-o-ong line. Maybe a hundred people including a lot of kids. I said it must be a holiday, there were so many school age childlren here. Neither of us could tolerate waiting in that line, on little sleep and after lots of walking. We found a Pret a Manger (natural food chain store), got a bite to eat, rested a little, walked outside and caught a taxi back to the hotel. Jon was exhausted and sacked out immediately for a couple hours. I didn’t sleep then, but slept about 10 hours that night.

I contacted Tom Mayberry, a fifth cousin from the Douglass Family, to see if he might be coming to London while we were there and we could meet for coffee. He is an archivist who is Chief Executive of the SW Heritage Trust in Somerset. If it hadn't been a 3 hour trip to Somerset, southwest of London, we might have visited, but that didn't make sense in the little time we had. It was a long shot. But Tom did reply the next day to say he was in France right then and sorry to miss us. He hoped we might meet each other on one side of the Atlantic or the other in the future. If you want to read about Tom and the Southwest Heritage Trust, you can find them with a search of the internet.