Conquering the London Tube

For millions of people public transportation is the main mode of getting around, especially in large cities like New York, Chicago, Paris, and of course London! But for so many other people, the subway/underground/tube is something completely foreign to them...I am one of those people. The ONLY time I had rode in a subway before going to London was once in San Francisco in midday. To say the least, it wasn't overwhelming. Do you know what seems to be overwhelming? The London Tube! I was absolutely terrified of this system when I realized how much we were going to be relying on this. But with some basic research beforehand, and some quick lessons once we were in London, Mike and I had the tube mastered by the end of our trip. Hopefully these tips will help you as well!  

So first off, if you have a smart phone get the Tube Map app by mXdata LTD. I referenced this in a previous post as well but it really is an amazing tool! If you're really unsure about the best way to get from Point A to Point B, this gives you the option of plugging in your location and destination and then gives you the best options using the tube or different public transport combinations to get you where you want to go without much difficulty. If you don't have a smart phone, check out the Transportation for London page. This will give you lots of other useful resources as well.


The next thing is two-fold; mind the gap & stand to the right! First, "Mind The Gap" isn't just a cute British saying, they mean it! When getting on and off the subway there is (of course) a gap between the platform and the subway car. It's not bad when you're not toting a huge piece of luggage around, or pushing a stroller (or Pram as the Brits call it), but when you are it makes things a bit more challenging. What doesn't help...Londoners don't mess around when it comes to getting somewhere! If you take your time getting off or on the car you're bound to have a couple people push their way through to keep going with their day. Honestly, the better you get at efficiently hoping off and on the subway, the better off you'll be when it comes to not being jostled about like a ping pong ball at the final table tennis round at the Olympics. Second, 'Stand to the right' refers to going up and down the escalators in and out of the tube stations. It's the general rule of thumb that if you're going to ride the escalator then you stand to the right,but if you're going to climb the escalator to speed up the process (which most Londoners do), then you use the left side of the escalator. I'm not sure if this applies to other cities as well but let me tell you it works wonderfully!

Lastly, get an Oyster card, or travel card (which is what we did). I actually would recommend getting a travel card if you're not going to be staying in London for a long period of time (but there's a catch, keep reading to the end of the paragraph). Here's my reasoning behind this. The Oyster card has to be loaded with money, each trip costs you money, and once you've used that money up it has to be reloaded. (Just for reference, using your Oyster card from Victoria Station to Piccadilly Circus will cost 2 pounds 10 pence.) The travel card, on the other hand, is for a set amount of days and you can use any public transport as much as you possibly can in that set period of time. The reason I would recommend this to people who are "doing the tourist thing" is because you are bound to take the wrong line at some point or another, or get off too early, or too late. I have to say, we didn't have this happen a lot, but it did happen enough that I would have started tallying up all the money we had wasted if we had Oyster cards instead of travel cards. Remember that catch I mentioned earlier? Well, turns out you can load a travel card onto an Oyster card! Best of both worlds! Why you ask? Well the downfall to the wonderful travel card is it's a flimsy piece of cardstock-like paper, similar to a movie ticket, which doesn't hold up well after a week of use. Now you can load it onto the credit card looking Oyster card and not worry about ruining the magnetic strip and having to get an attendant to get let in or out of the station. Here's the link to more Oyster card information: http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/19799.aspx.

Hopefully now that I've given you some tips on 'The Tube,' you'll be more able to use it with ease. Because honestly, it's one of the most London-y things to do while you're there! And remember...

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

Mike & Alicia

So You're Ready to Fly Across "The Pond"

Flying to different time zones is always difficult, and draining to say the least. Jet lag can pretty much ruin your first day, or more, in your destination due to feeling mentally & physically exhausted from the flight. And who really wants that? I've come up with some great ways to reduce OR PREVENT jet lag all together when flying. One last thing before I get into the nitty-gritty, I've again labeled this as a post about international flying but America's a HUGE country compared to most so these tips I'm giving aren't just for international flights but for traveling within the country as well.

Up at 6am for the Royal Baby Announcement!

I was CONVINCED our trip to England was going to leave us exhausted, and hating our first couple days in London, but I'm a stubborn little brat when it comes to getting my way. There was no way I was going to succumb to the awful term travelers use all too much "jet lag." Once I realized we would be leaving Portland International Airport in Oregon at 2:00PM on a Wednesday and getting into London Heathrow at 11:00AM on Thursday, it was like a challenge I was convinced I would come out notorious over. I WOULD NOT BE JET LAGGED. Well, let's just say I almost conquered this beast, I didn't deliver the fatal blow, but man did I put it in the ICU for our trip. So here's what I did...

First off, I knew there is no way my body could adjust to the 8 hour time difference from Oregon to London when it came time to sleep once we were over there. Thankfully, our hotel had the perfect solution! No, it wasn't light blocking window shades (which don't really cut it completely now do they?), but they actually had rooms without windows! Okay, I can see all of the eye rolling from here but I realize not everyone is going to love this idea. Mike and I were completely okay with not getting a 4 star hotel as we were just sleeping and showering there so not having windows wasn't a big deal as we stayed out in the city until we were exhausted and got up as soon as we were recharged and ready to beat the streets again. I have to say this is the best way to help adjust to the time. We just shut off all the lights when we needed to go to bed and within a couple minutes Mike was snoring away and I wasn't far behind...and it was only 2:00 PM back home!
So the next tip was HARD, especially with our work schedules. Our plan was to try to adjust our sleep schedules by a couple hours at home before leaving, to make it a bit easier on us once we were there. The plan for a couple weeks before leaving included going to bed and waking up 1 hour earlier for a week and then earlier by another hour, and another. Mike was working until 10:00-11:00PM most nights for the month prior so he really couldn't do this, and I tried to stay away to welcome him home most nights, so I wasn't great at doing this either. When it came down to it, the last week I was able to change my schedule by about an hour and a half. Not the most successful story, I know, but a tip all the same.

St Pancras Station outside of Kings Cross

The next couple tips all need to be implemented about 1-2 weeks before leaving. First...PACK! EARLY! The last thing you want to be doing is stay up late the night before you leave for your flight doing laundry and packing. I started packing 2 weeks prior to our trip (since Mike wouldn't let me pack any sooner) and by the Sunday before our Wednesday flight, our bags were all ready to go except my makeup and some other little things that had to be packed the day of. It was so nice not stressing about missing something since I took my time and had time to remember anything I may have forgotten. Next, stay hydrated. You're body is naturally going to be exhausted from the long flight  but you need to keep it healthy and happy with plenty of fluids...and I don't mean soda! Drinks lots of water, about half your body weight in ounces is a good guideline to use. During your flight you need to be drinking lots of water as well (this will give you a reason to get up and moving when you have to use the bathroom!).
Once you arrive in your destination, try to stay awake until your normal bedtime in the new time zone. The best way to do this is to hit the ground running. Don't nap if you can help it and stay up and moving as best you can. Don't do bus tours, but rather a walking tour or take a stroll through a park. Whatever it is, keep moving...your body will love you once it is time for bed!

If you can stick with these tips you can definitely help curb jet lag, if not cut it out completely. Here's a little video with further explanation on some of the tips given: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGKWbqixWSg.

And remember...

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

Mike & Alicia

Tips on Bookings Your Flight to London

So you've decided to go to London (or anywhere for that matter, it doesn't have to be London). You've probably already figured out how long you'd like to be gone for and possibly have a general idea of what you want to do while you're over there. So what's next? Booking your flight over course! Mike & I spent quite a bit of time pushing this off because of the expense, but finally bit the bullet about 6 months before we planned to leave. It is a large expense but I was able to save about $800 for our two tickets from Portland International Airport to London. Also, I have one major tip that, if you can afford it, will make your flight much more enjoyable...I wish we would have done it.

For starters, there are so many great booking sites for flights but there are a few that I really love. My all time favorite is (and this is hard for me, if you know my preferred search engine you'll understand) BING. They have a great travel tab that also has the best invention since sliced bread called the 'Price Predictor.' This little doozy lets you know if you should buy your tickets then due to probable price increase, or wait because prices are going to drop soon. It helped us quite a bit as we did take our time checking flight prices for about 3-4 months prior to booking. I would also recommend doing just that, take your time looking for flights. Another great site for booking flights is kayak of course. I will say that always remember that you can book flights directly from the airline, and this is actually how we found the best deal, with help from Bing Travel.

Waiting for our flight at PDX

 Along with finding a great booking site, there are others things that can help save a buck or two. Although most are obvious, sometimes these tips are often forgotten. First, try mid-week flights. Specifically Tuesdays and Wednesdays as those are usually the cheapest flight days. Second, if you don't have your heart set on going in the summer, or if you can go during another time of the year, do. It'll save you some serious cash! I just took a quick look at Bing Travel for flights in late November to early December and found round trip airfare for under $1,000, and some dates under $900! And lastly, sign up for email alerts from airlines directly and follow Twitter and Facebook accounts for deals. Many times airfares will send out great promos to their email subscribers and will post other deals on their social media first.

Now for something that won't save you money, seat options. When we flew we didn't dare think about upgrading out of coach. "It's not worth the money!" my husband and I both said. Let me throw something out there, spending 12+ hours in a plane in a crappy little seat jammed in between two other people, or having to worry about keeping your legs out of the aisle while trying to sleep as you stress about the entire day you're losing while flying isn't fun...at all. If you have a bigger budget I would definitely recommend upgrading. Here's why. I did everything right to prepare for our flight, every tip in the book to decrease jet lag and sleep on the plane. I maybe slept a half hour the entire time because I was so uncomfortable, however I didn't have jet lag so I know I did something right. Honestly, it's worth it to get the extra room with less noise (Considering I probably wouldn't have had the infant in front of me toying with my emotions as I dozed off into slumber only to have him start screaming his lungs out to startle me back awake) so that you can be well rested when you land in London the following morning ready for a quick refresh at the hotel and on to seeing the sites. 

Many other tips and tricks are available, some of the best are by the folks at Ytravel.com. Check them out as they were what gave me the inspiration to start this wonderful blog. And remember...

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

Mike & Alicia

Top 5 websites & apps for planning your London Trip

Last post I gave you some starting tips on planning. I'm mean the very, very basics. Boring, I know, but I felt like it needed to be done. The reason I did that post was for one very important reason...we found things to do that our local travel agency didn't even know about! Originally we went into a local agency thinking that the whole planning process was going to be too stressful. So we trekked into Travel Le...ahem...a travel agency (That, for their own sake, won't be named due to the horrible experience we had with them on multiple occasions.) and asked for help with planning our trip off of the list of attractions we had come up with. The guy didn't know about many things on our list! AND, he claimed to have planned multiple trips to London and England for people. 

Okay, I'm going to jump off my Google soapbox and get down to the fun stuff! I found so many websites on London attractions while researching what we wanted to do, but it took a lot of time. I mean, believe me, I was more than willing to put in the time, but after a while it got a bit daunting! I would scour the internet at work, at home, and even woke up at 3 AM on the weekend because I just knew that there had to be another website with more information. So...rather than putting you all through the same wretched process here is my Top 5 websites & apps for planning your London Trip.

1.  Visitlondon.com

     This website seriously kicks arse! Although I knew a lot of the main attractions we wanted to see (i.e. Big Bed, Westminster, Buckingham Palace), I didn't enjoy spending the time finding the official website for each spot to find opening times, location & cost. If you find an attraction on the Visit London site it automatically has the name as a link you can click on for more information and within that, a link to the official website. ON TOP OF THAT, it also has multiple other functions like hotel information, itineraries, information on international travel, and tons of discounts in a 'Special Offers' section. Who doesn't love a good deal? They do have an app however it's called "Official London."

2. Londonpass.com

     If you want to hit the main 'touristy' things in London (as we did), you need to buy this pass. The pass gets you into over 60 attractions around London for FREE, and there are hundreds of pounds more in discounts at restaurants, attractions & stores. You can buy the passes in 1,2,3 & 6 day passes and it also has the option of the 'travel' card as well. This gives you access to the London underground, overground, and rail system with unlimited journeys for however many days you add. It can seem a bit spendy at first, but I guarantee our 6 day passes with travel was paid for just in how much we used the tube alone. FYI, they do have an app for this site.

3. Tripadvisor.com

     This one may seem obvious for many people but it helped a lot when we were looking to book with certain tour guide agencies since sometimes the agencies website reviews are a little skewed in my opinion. Again, like visitlondon, they have a ton of deals on hotels and restaurants but really use it for the reviews. I also liked checking out the travel forums so I could see other questions people were asking about their trips. Let me tell you, I got a ton of answers to questions I didn't even know I had until someone else asked it. Again, app available.

4. Tube Map App by mXdata LTD.

     I thought I would just use this app one we were over there but by the second day we really had the whole system down. I actually used it much more before hand as you can type in your starting and ending point and it will give you multiple ways of getting from Point A to Point B. From quickest, to least stairs, to the least amount of line changes, it really makes getting around London much lest stressful. It helped me so much when planning for how long I needed to allot for travel time between attractions. The link above isn't to the app but just search "tube map" in your app market at it will come up. The symbol looks like the picture to the right. The link will, however, take you to the official transport website for London, which is very useful as well.

5. LonelyPlanet.com

     Another great website for researching attractions and hotels but I loved all the practical travel tips it had on the best ATMs to use, how to tip, average costs of eating out, and tons of information on other travel and transportation options. Nothing overly special, but definitely informative and full of great information.

P.S. Their travel books are amazing! Check them out here http://shop.lonelyplanet.com/ for guidebooks, phrasebooks for other languages, and even books on activities like Trekking and Cycling!

I hope this information helps you all with your planning needs. And a quick note, Tripadvisor and Lonely Planet will work on any vacation planning, so keep these in your back pocket for plenty of other trips down the road. And remember...

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

Mike & Alicia

Planning, Planning & More Planning

So as I mentioned in my introduction, this blog will first, and foremost, focus on the wonderful trip we took to London & Paris in July 2013. Let me start off by explaining something, I'm the textbook Type A personality. If I'm planning something I'm going to be obsessive over the smallest details, which can make for a little more stress than usual, however I knew once we left everything was in order for the best time of our lives. That being said, let's move on to the planning!

Oh the Brit lifestyle...

Many people ask us why we choose London as our destination, and I honestly can't say exactly why. One(Remember this thought of mine a couple posts from now.) Once we decided on Europe we just had to nail down where within that beautiful continent we wanted to visit. I'll admit this, we are a couple of chickens because a main concern was the language barrier. We had never been overseas, and I'd only gone to Mexico, so we wanted to make sure we could communicate well where ever we went. This narrowed our options significantly and finally landed on London! 
thing I know is, I have always been fascinated with the British; High tea, royalty, castles, and who can resist those British accents! Am I the only one who can't help but have a grin from ear to ear when I hear a Brit talking? (You can imagine what I looked like walking around in London right?) My husband and I threw around the idea of cruises in tropical locations or becoming beach bums for a week in Hawaii or Mexico but then I thought "Why not Europe? Who says you have to go someplace hot & sunny for vacation?"

Planning a week long trip can seem daunting to say the least, but let me tell you, it's not as scary as it seems. My first tip is GOOGLE IT (if you're into Bing that's alright, I won't hold it against you). It may seem obvious, but as most of my friends and family know, I'm a huge Google girl. It's really not that hard, type in your destination and nearly any major city, state/region, or country will have a tourism site. We went through and made a list from multiple websites including anything we thought sounded semi-interesting. Remember, once you say "Oh that looks fun!" it doesn't mean that you are locked in to doing it. Once we had our list made we researched it more. We looked at everything about the attractions on our list; where it was, how long it may take to see it, the COST, special sites within the attraction, and then from there decided whether or not it would make our final list. As you can imagine our original list was MASSIVE! 

Just a couple things to see right?

We spent quite some time making what we thought was going to be our final list of attractions in London. Little did we know at that time, we were a bit naive about how many things you can see in a week. Don't get me wrong, we saw a lot, but we definitely didn't get all that we wanted in. Second tip, be willing to compromise. Yeah you can see Big Ben, Westminster, Changing of the Guard, tour Buckingham Palace, go on the London Eye, tour Parliament and tour St Paul's Cathedral in one day, but do you want to have more than 5 minutes at each place? I'm sure this isn't the first time you've read "Quality over Quantity," and I can't agree more. I still feel like we overdid it a bit going from attraction to attraction and it took a couple days in London to slow down and enjoy the daily life that was happening around us. When you start planning, be realistic about the time you want to take at certain places. If you're a photo-fanatic, like myself, you better allot a little bit extra time, I was shocked at how much time I spent snapping pictures of amazing architectural details, animals (15 minutes or so alone on the ravens at the Tour of London), and of ourselves. 

What to do next? Okay, here's where my Type A-ness kicks in because I'm smiling from ear to ear just while writing this...spreadsheet time! I love spreadsheets, everything about them screams order and organization, I just love them. It's sick I know, but it's how I am. Now I know there's plenty of "wing it" travelers out there, but I'm not one of them. Below you can see part of my spreadsheet, I broke it down with the days across the top and times in half hour slots down the side. Remember, this picture is after months of tweaking and adjusting our plans for our dream vacation, so this isn't what your's will look like from the get go. Trust me, still saved on my computer, I have about 4 or 5 different itineraries saved just for reference on changes I had already made. Stick with it and don't get discouraged because this was our saving grace while we were over there. As you can see, I left huge blocks of time for things, but it was a good thing because although I had planned for travel time in between locations, there were times that this ran over. FYI: Taking the tube from Heathrow to King's Cross on the Piccadilly Line takes an hour...not fun after an already exhausting 12 hours of flying over an entire day, pay the extra money and take the Heathrow Express (more on that later).  

Again...I warned you about the Type A bit.

Well, I'm sure your brains are mush about now, so I bid you farewell for now and will continue this planning bit tomorrow. And remember...

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

Mike & Alicia

Welcome to the travel blog of Mike & Alicia

So I have to admit, this blog will mostly be done by me, Alicia, rather than my lovely husband Mike. Fret not, as I've been told on multiple occasions by my better half, I have plenty of personality and quirks to keep him on his toes so hopefully I won't bore you folks too much!

Our Wedding Day with our "child"

Mike & I have recently started traveling after we got married, mostly local areas along the west coast, however we finally became International travelers this year when we went to London and Paris for a week for our first anniversary. To say the least, I've caught the whole "wanderlust" bug, and can't wait for our next big trip. Although we haven't been everywhere (okay I realize we can count the countries we've been to on one hand, but bear with me) we learned so much from our voyage across the pond and decided we wanted to put our experiences out there for others to learn from. Our main goal is to get other people to see how amazing traveling can really be! One fun little fact, our home state of Oregon has a total land area of 255,026km², yet the total LAND surface of Earth is 148,940,00km²! I'd say we have some more exploring to do.

Waiting to board the plane to London!

We can't wait to share our most recent journey through London and Paris, and future journeys already in the works. Keep an eye out for lots of travel tips, strategies and inspiration to help your travel journey be just as amazing as your dreams!


And Remember...The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

Mike & Alicia