Double A Takes The UK | Part I

Canada to United Kingdom

It has been 4 years since my last trip abroad. While I have made small trips to the United States here and there, the last 2 years has been a prison in my house. I can’t tell you how excited I was to finally be in a new country discovering their culture and enjoying everything they have to offer.

While this trip was mostly booked to see my significant other. I was extremely excited to see the UK. Considering we both live in different countries, the first trip over to each other has to involve seeing where the other is from and exploring. Our plan was to spend 2 weeks in England, 1 week in Wales and 1 week in Scotland. Did that go to plan, definitely not, you will find out why soon.

Flying out of Pearson, I had never seen the airport so dead before. Between 3pm to 11pm only 12 flights were flying out of terminal one. I remember when I left for Germany 4 years ago, you could hardly keep up with where you had to go because so many flights were heading out. It was such a stark difference. Being the early bird that I am I was at the airport 4 hours early, flew through baggage check and security and had 3.5 hours to kill on the other side. I know they tell you to get there 3 hours early because of restrictions but that had to be the fastest I have ever made it through security in my life.

After a 3.5 hour wait and a 6 hour plane ride (slept through almost all of it), I arrived….

If there is one thing I can say about Heathrow Airport it is that you walk and walk and walk and when you just think you are finished walking, you have to walk a bit more. The airport is massive just like Munich, except Munich has an underground rail system that takes you between terminals so you don’t have to walk as much (I’m looking at you Heathrow, you should install one). After all the walking and going through an electronic customs, I had made it. I will say I’m a bit disappointed that I received no stamps in my passport showing I arrived in the UK. I am grateful how quickly I was able to get through customs but my traveller self was sad.

Once meeting up with Ed, I soon realized he had completely forgotten where he parked the car. While I am one to always snap a picture of the area I am in and the floor, he just decided to wing it. After riding the elevator for 15 minutes he finally realized that the car was indeed parked on floor 1. The floor we started on.

Once we were on our way to his house, I had a lovely two hour drive to enjoy, taking in the country side of England. What I didn’t expect to see what such drastic changes in weather within 10 minutes. What started as a sunny beautiful day, turned into dense fog that you could barely see the car in front of you. That soon turned back into a clear sunny day with only the other side of the highway covered in dense fog. The weather in England had my head spinning with such huge changes in such little time.

Once we arrived at his, we had a relaxing afternoon that turned into the best nap of my life.