London

The flight from Cape Town to London Heathrow breezes by, and seems much shorter than 11 hours. Even on British Airways. Even better, arriving at the hotel St Ermin’s in St James’s Park at 8:30 on a Sunday morning finds my room is ready! I can forgive anything at this point. It’s a nicely appointed room, but you still can’t swing a cat in it.

Spring has hit London – it’s still struggling to get above 10 degrees after a warmer than usual start to the season a week or so ago, but an early morning stroll around St James’s Park has the cherry blossom out in force, along with a dizzying arrays of languages spoken by the various tourists also partaking of a sunny Sunday morning. I can hear Spanish, French, Russian, Italian, and I think that one’s Polish. Maybe Croatian. English? Not so much.

I have sent my cold weather expedition clothes home from South Africa, so today is a clothes shopping day. A couple of cheap pairs of jeans from Marks and Sparks, and a nice red mackintosh from Hobbs and I’m pretty much set.  Except for the blisters.  A month in hiking boots, wellies and thongs has softened my feet to the point where my street shoes have left both ankles not only with Olympic standard blisters, but they are bleeding as well. I retire hurt to the hotel and try band-aids.  Who’s the April fool now then?