Sabbatical Blog: 9/11 London, UK - Heptonstall, UK

9/11 London to the North
Today, we pick up our Rental car, and try to cram our stuff into it, before heading towards Manchester to visit Traci’s old friend Larry Chan and his wife Janine.

Before picking up the car, we made a quick journey to the London Eye for go-around. It was the perfect day for the Eye it was almost completely clear. After the Eye, we hurried back to the hotel to check-out and catch a Taxi to the Hertz location. We upgraded to a station-wagon so we could accommodate our luggage, we got a Ford Mondeo Wagon, 6-speed Manual Diesel. Despite being a Ford, it was actually a nice car. It had seat warmers/coolers and had plenty of power for the Motorway. Getting out of the city was a little nerve wracking with traffic and just starting to drive on the left side of the road, on the right hand side of the car, and shifting with my left hand. I think I must have stalled the car like 3 times on the way out of the city. (there was traffic so it wasn’t that bad).

It is about a 3 and half hour drive to their place, however, there are a few slowdowns along the way due to construction. Average speed is about 80 mph, though the regulation speed limit is 70 mph, but I didn’t learn that fact until asking Larry and Janine. There are no speed limit numbers posted on the road, only in the slow down areas.

We took the M1 to the M62 and were to meet Larry and Janine at the Hospital. Larry and Janine are expecting a baby any day now, by C-section originally scheduled for 9/14, but re-scheduled for 9/19. Larry gave us the wrong Junction to get off the Motorway. And without detailed map, we couldn’t find our way to the hospital (of which we didn’t have the name of). We only knew we wanted to get on the A629, from there we were certain we could find the hospital. After another 3 hours of being lost, stopping for directions in the small towns of northern England. We got reasonably close the hospital, and was able to borrow the cell phone of the Security guard at a Tesco gas-station/mini-mart. The people at this Tesco were especially nice and helpful, in trying to get us on track. We finally arrived at Larry and Janine’s place in Heptonstall around 11PM. It was a long day, but we were truly blessed in that Kylie didn’t freak out on us after having been in her car-seat for so long! She was so patient, if she had been freaking out, throwing a fit, it would’ve have increased the stress level by at least an order of magnitude.

Big Ben!


Traci and Kylie on our way to the London Eye.


Traci and Kylie checking out the view from our eye-pod.


Me with Big Ben and the House of Parliament in the background.


And Me, gearing up for our maiden journey driving on the wrong side of the car. It was very strange shifting with my left hand, and it took some getting used to the 6-speed transmission, since Reverse was off to the left of 1st gear.