We woke up at 9:45 in the scary hotel room and got ourselves ready. We got downstairs and the owner guy told us we were too late for breakfast, which had ended at 10. It was 10:05. Sarah and I looked at each other, all sad, for about 2 seconds which apparently made him feel guilty enough to offer us breakfast anyway! ("Ok, ok, since it's you, I'll give you breakfast." Score!) Since it was illegal, he put us in a little dining room away from the stairs (so no other late people would be jealous) then gave us a huge amount of bread, some ham and a pot of tea. After we were done (being the crafty resourceful girl I am) I took a hunk of bread, stuffed the leftover ham into it - voila! instant lunch!
After we heaved our huge backpacks on ourselves, we popped over to Midi train station on a tram then threw those bags into a locker. The first locker we tried gave us problems for about 10 minutes; then we decided to try a new one and it worked right away (of course!). Our Eurostar didn't leave until that evening, so I proposed that we check out the big green park on the map.
The park ended up not being as big as I thought, but we spent a while there sitting by a nice fountain and I ate my ham sandwich. Then, I got pooped on by a bird. Sarah thought it was hilarious but I did NOT. Thank goodness I bought those enormous sunglasses in Rome- most of the poo landed on my shades and a little bit got on my jeans (but none in my hair, whew!). So after that funness, we took a stroll around the park which was very nice. On one entire side of the park there was this public art- it was digital photos from all over the world blown up into giant posters. We spent a while looking at those and reading the captions. We also saw a big map of the world on the ground (like in a box... strange) and Sarah got in and pointed to all the places we had been and measured how far we were from home.
Eventually we headed back over to the old center and got some food. Sarah and I had a big huge argument over her Ketchup flavored chips (Sarah insisted I try them; I didn't want to- I thought that sounded gross...) but then we got over it. Then we decided to find an internet place (which took forever) then we headed back to the train station (via free Metro/ tram action).We were an hour early, good thing too because our tickets would not print out of the kiosk! In the end we got them printed out, got through all the security / passport checkpoints then waited for about 5 minutes and got right onto the Eurostar!
The train ride was smooth (had a few crying babies) and we arrived back in London a few hours earlier than I expected (poor calculations on my part). We walked from Waterloo station to Victoria, in part to kill some time and also so Sarah could get a new English shot glass, since her original one broke. The walk to Victoria was a long one. We took a few rests (very necessary, considering the bags we were carrying) and got there without dying.We spent a few kind of boring hours in the train station, mostly trying to get food (on my part) and people watching. A funny incident was when I finally decided to get some Chinese food at a little cart near where we were sitting- and pay for it in change. Turned out that I was about 25p short so the people in line behind me were kind enough to sponsor me. I think I irritated the lady at the cart because I couldn't really count the money... it took me so long!! It ended up being pretty good AND I got rid of my extra change!
We planned the leg back to London so I would be early for my bus up to Edinburgh and Sarah would have plenty of time to make it to the airport and catch her flight. At around 10:30, I headed over to the Victoria Coach station and Sarah took the Gatwick express to the airport (her flight was at 6AM or so).Next.... the bumpy bus ride up to Scotland and my 3 day Haggis tour!
