After returning from my ride in the country I had only a few days left in Rome before I had to leave. I hate saying that. Why do I have to leave? What's making me leave? If there's one thing I've learned this past year is that I don't HAVE to do anything. Yeah, I know we all have responsibilities in life, but I have come to the realization that most of the things we think we have to do, we really don't. I call them "self imposed limits". For example: when it was time for me to leave Rome last March for the first time because that's when my plane was scheduled to take me back to California. I practically killed myself trying to make the decision to stay longer or leave, literally right up to the last hours of the last night. Why? Because I had a plane ticket to leave? So what? I changed it and had two more incredible weeks in Rome that I wouldn't trade for the world, and that led me to return again for this last trip, which led me to Greece and to all my good friends there, and even to London. It's the most liberating feeling when you can say to yourself "why not?" and just do something. I'll never forget calling my English friend Charlotte the day that I was supposed to be on a plane back to the states and told her I was still in Rome. "Your absolutely mad!", she said. It's hard for me to explain, but just think about it the next time you say "I have to....." Do you really?I didn't really do anything special those last couple of days in Rome. I had a lot on my mind and I needed to get some things in order before leaving. The main thing was the flight home I didn't want to take. I know, it seems I have a problem boarding return flights, but as I was saying before...
I was scheduled to make a connection in London before heading to San Francisco, so I decided that might be a good time to see London for a couple days. I called Charlotte who is now living there to see if she had some free time and maybe a couch I could sleep on. She said yes, so I paid a few extra dollars to have a stopover there, putting off the inevitable flight home just a little longer. 
It's only a two hour flight from Rome to London so that was no problem. The only difficult thing was that I now had to manage the London train system with all my things, including a backpack, my small suitcase and a larger one that I brought on this trip to carry my motorcycle gear. Fortunately Charlotte gave me good directions to her house detailing which trains I had to get on and where to get off. I think it was a combination of two or three trains/subway lines to get to her flat on the other side of town, which took about as long as the flight there. When I finally arrived, Charlotte was at a pub where she had to meet some people. Fortunately her roommate Kathryn was there to greet me. After unloading my things, Kathryn and I hopped on a double decker bus to meet everyone at the pub. There is no rest for the weary, but nothing a nice brew with a few cute English gals couldn't fix.
The next day Charlotte took me sightseeing in the city. We first went to Piccadilly Circus, London's version of Time's Square with all the brilliant billboards. It was an interesting contrast with the surrounding old buildings.
The first thing you're reminded of when in England is that they drive on the wrong side of the road. It really messed with my head while walking around. Fortunately they have these handy reminders painted at the crosswalks to help out us Yanks and most of the rest of the world. With my head spinning we decided to have some lunch, which was some sort of a hand-held pie with meat and veggies inside. We sat on a balcony overlooking popular large square. It was a place where street entertainers take turns doing random stunts to thrill the crowds of passersby and make a few quid, or a lot of cash if you're good. When we sat down there was a guy juggling large knives while standing atop a two-legged ladder. He had a large crowd watching him, and when he finished he really raked in the dough. 
After his show the crowd dispersed, leaving the next guy to round up another crowd to draw from. He did a lot of yelling and really made it seem like something big was going to happen. He grabbed a few boys from the crowd and had them lay on the ground, then spent another 15 minutes making more noise but doing nothing. It's amazing watching the "sheep mentality" from above as dozens of people stopped, but still nobody had any idea what he was going to do or why they were even standing there. If I'm boring you now then I'm doing a good job of describing the feeling we had watching all this. Once everybody was there, the guy started the "show" by changing his pants right in front of everybody (sounds worse than it was, but still..). Then he made a feeble attempt at balancing something on his head, until finally, the moment we'd all been waiting for. With the boys still lying on the ground, in line from head to foot, he stood on his hands and clumsily walked over the boys, surely spitting in their faces as he passed over them. And that was it! It was without a doubt the worst "entertainment" I have ever been subject too. What a wanker! 
After that, a refreshing walk through a nice park full of Autumn colors led us to Buckingham Palace. I guess I had imagined a palace to be a bit more glitzy, but I guess it is pretty big. Unfortunately we didn't get to see the changing of the guard, maybe next time.
Another stroll through the park and we were in front of Big Ben and the Parliament building. Those were pretty impressive to see, and so was Westminster Abby, the old cathedral nearby. We didn't go inside though since it was pretty crowded and you have to pay.
Spending money was something I tried to avoid in London since everything is fairly expensive, plus the fact that it takes 2 U.S. dollars to buy just 1 Sterling pound, which means that everything costs us Americans double. We walked along the river a bit and got a good view of the London Eye, a huge Ferris wheel. I wanted to go in it, but since it was a gloomy day with no sun I figured I wouldn't be able to see much from up there anyway and skipped it. 
Since it was Tea Time, Charlotte took me to a posh part of town were we had a proper English tea in a small cafe. I had a nice afternoon with Charlotte and I'm glad I got to spend some time with her again. 
Later that day we talked Kathryn into meeting us for dinner, and ironically we went for burgers. They were good though, and something I hadn't had in a while. Another thing I hadn't had while in Italy were fresh baked chocolate chip cookies, which happens to be my favorite food. Fortunately, in London there are many cookie stands in the train stations and shopping malls that make outstanding cookies. Never mind that 3 cookies and a glass of milk cost me $10 U.S., they were good. After eating we got a drink at a pub then took an evening stroll across the River Thames. The views were incredible, as you can see in the photo at the top of the page (click on it for a larger view).The next day was Saturday and the girls had planned to have a Halloween party at their flat. That meant we had to do a little shopping and prepare the house. We spent the day running around town and finished up with a classic English lunch, fish'n'chips, with a side of mushy peas. The fish was handily wrapped in a paper cone with the chips, and it was all really good.
After eating the girls got to work on the house and I got to work on carving the pumpkins. We finished just in time for people to start showing up. The girls both dressed as witches, which turned out to be a popular costume with the ladies, while most of the guys weren't in costume. There was a good turn-out for the party, with one Italian, one French and an American (me) to give it an international feel, but I was the only one on the plus side of 30. 
My last day in London I decided to let the girls clean house (I did my part the night before) while I did a little sightseeing on my own. I took a train to the edge of town to see the Ace Cafe, a classic biker hangout made famous in the 50's and 60's by two London motorcycle clubs, called the Mods and the Rockers, who used to hang there and get in fights. It was raining a bit and there wasn't too much going on there that afternoon, but I had lunch and can now say I was there too. 
The cafe happened to be very close to the new Wembley Stadium, a brand new billion dollar stadium which at that very moment was hosting an NFL game between the NY Giants and Miami Dolphins. I had no idea that was happening until I saw the advertisements in the Tube, the London subway. However they had already sold-out all 90 thousand tickets so I couldn't go. I went back to the center of the city and walked around a bit, which led me to the famous Tower Bridge. 
It was impressive, but I didn't feel like going up to the top level so I just walked across it and found my way back to the train station. When I arrived back at the flat the girls had the house shining clean and even had a nice meal prepared. We were all a bit tired so we just took it easy that evening. 
The next day I said goodbye to Charlotte as she left for work, then I said goodbye to Kathryn before getting on the train to the airport.....
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