Day 16 - Sea day and arrived back in England

Just another day at sea on Friday. Regular schedule, and in the evening they had a ventriloquist as the entertainment and he was really good. He had been a performer on the America's Got Talent television show. Very funny.

Oh, and I took some photos of the library on board the ship.

A globe is the only map that doesn't distort the size of some countries.

Lots of board games.

Books and magazines.

When we woke up Saturday morning, we were back in port at Southampton where we had started out from 17 days ago. Apparently the ship had arrived back earlier than planned, although we don't know how much earlier, and they came out with an announcement saying you could get off earlier than scheduled if you wished to. This really made no difference to us since our bus tickets to London were for 12:15pm.

We packed our bags and went up for breakfast. Ruth made up a lunch for us with some of  the buffet offerings.

We were scheduled to get off the ship at 9:30am, but we were ready at about 8:45am so we did it then. We had a 2 km walk from the cruise terminal to the bus station. Of course we were way early for our 12:15pm bus, so we asked if we could get on an earlier one. The next one was sold out, but the 10:45am one was a possibility.

Sure enough, we managed to get on the 10:45am bus, although it was making a stop at Heathrow Airport as well. No problem, as we had lots of time. Almost everyone got off the bus at Heathrow, and there were only five of us remaining from Heathrow to London's Victoria Station. The National Express buses are usually cheapest when you book as far in advance as possible. We had booked it a few months ago and paid £7.75 ($14.50 CAD, $10.50 USD) each for the almost 3 hour bus ride.

We had to take one tube subway line, and then an overground train to Ruth's aunt's house in the London district of Hackney. It cost £2.90 ($5.45 CAD, $3.95 USD) each for the subway ride.

Ruth's Auntie Nice (pronounced like Neece, short for Bernice) just turned 80 and has lived here for over 40 years. She is Ruth's dad's youngest sister. We've been here several times before.

We went out for a walk around the area.

There is a busy outdoor market nearby on Saturdays.

Canal boats.

Okay then.

With gorillas above overlooking the sharks. Strange.

I don't think this canal boat has moved for a long time.

Lilly pad flowers.

So, we're in London for two nights. But we aren't going to head downtown. We've been to London many times, and we're just going to relax today. Tomorrow (Monday) we take the tube back to Victoria Station and then the bus to Gatwick Airport for our Vueling flight to Barcelona.

So glad we didn't book anything with Air Canada, who's flight attendants are currently on strike. There were several people on the bus yesterday who got off at Heathrow not knowing if they were going anywhere! Fortunately, it looks like the federal government is intervening to put a stop to it. But if they knew they were going to intervene, why didn't they put a stop to it before it even started! 

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Decent price drop on this Ninja Air Fryer.

And in Canada...

Great deal on this unlocked Samsung A36 Smartphone.