Day 12 - Girls Worldwide say "Pax Lodge"

July 11 - Day 12: Today is a travel day for us. From Ace to Pax Lodge. We would have liked to stay just at Pax Lodge, but they were all booked up for the time period we needed.

It is a reasonable Metro ride to the Pax area. Then a walk uphill with all our luggage, but the town is lovely with all sorts of lovely restaurants.

We checked our luggage into the storage area and then headed out to explore. Parliment Hill was the place to go, we were told, and you can see a great view of London from the top.

Back down the hill for lunch at the Hampstead Tea Room. We threw them for a loop with trying to serve all 11 of us at one time, but the food was terrific. And our credit card was APPROVED!!

Off to a tour of Keats House. Interesting, but again, not enough "stuff" for it to feel like a real house.

Now that it is time to check into Pax, we head back to settle into our new rooms. Once we all get into our rooms, it seems like the Taj Mahal! Fresh towels, fans, easily accisible drinking water, ICE, and I don't have to sleep in a bunk bed! (well, at least for one night)

After a short siesta, we gather together to head out for Benjamin Franklin's house. It is the only remaining resideince of his standing and since we are from Philly and all, it seemed like we HAD to visit! The tour was different then any other hosue tour I have seen. The tour guide was in character and she moved us from empty room to empty room to see videos about his life. It was interesting, but again... not exactly what we were looking for.

Now it is dinner time and we head off to look for one of the restaurants that gives us a discount with the London Pass. To get there, we have to walk through Picadilly square... and we realize as we hit the huge crowds that tonight is the World Cup finals. We decide pretty quick that we will eat dinner and head directly home, before the game is over. There is a large screen in the square that we assume will show the game. We don't want to be part of the craziness!

We found the restaurant, which looks lovely, but the server was way cranky. He was not happy to have to serve our rag-tag group and was even less thrilled that we wanted to use the buy one get one free entree coupon. Hey... they are the ones who offered the coupon to us! The food was good - more expensive, smaller portions - but good. Luckily, by now we all end up sharing our meals at the end and everyone always gets enough to eat (and we get to try everything!)

Getting home was uneventful... thankfully!