A week in England

So, time to visit the misty isle yet again for the week. This being January, it wasn’t a prospect I was looking forward weather-wise. So imagine my surprise as I got out of the plane at London Heathrow, and found myself enjoying a clear, crispy winter day. Of course, this was to quickly turn (in fact, during my taxi trip from the airport) into the usual rainy, grey weather that dominates in England this time of the year. OK, so maybe I’m exaggerating a bit ;-)



Anyway, no big deal, as this was a trip for business, rather than pleasure. Although I can happily report that I did indeed manage to squeeze in a bit of pleasure as well, as of course frequent visits to the pub are mandatory during any kind of trip to England.

Monday night I met up with Stephane and Phil at the Stoke in Guildford (which was my local when I lived in Guildford). The plan was to merely have a pizza and a quick pint and then head to the cinema – obviously I never made it to the cinema and had more than the quick pint instead ;-).



Tuesday evening followed a similar formula, although this time in Fleet. After a couple of pints with some colleagues in the Heron on the Lake (two of whom were drinking coke, to my disgust, as a result of some misguided new year’s resolutions!), we headed to Fleet town centre for a jolly good Italian in Il Castello.


On Wednesday evening, it was time to head to that other regular Guildford venue, the Guildford Tup, where I met the old Guildford gang (Stephane, Maxim, Sandrine, Russel and Martha), who filled me in on all the latest gossip.


Thursday night was more ambitious, as we headed all the way out to London. The plan was to meet up at Ye Olde Chesire Cheese, which is one of the oldest, and most charming, pubs in London. There has been a pub on its premises at Fleet street (right in the financial district of London) since 1538 (the current building dates back to 1667 – as the original pub was destroyed during the great fire of London). It’s gotta be one of my favourites pubs in London – its main qualities being that it’s cozy, intimate, and
sells cheap beer (actually the pub is operated by the Samuel Smith brewery – and only sells Sam Smith beer and no big-name soft drinks/hard liqueur. Commendable!).





After a few beers there, Ed (our local representative, who actually works across the street from the pub) took us to a nice curry house next doors. After a filling Indian, it was time to head back to Waterloo to catch the last train back…. (Although we did have time to squeeze a quick pint at the Fire Station).

The journey back to France was, shall we say, not as smooth as it could have been. After a delayed departure of about 1 ½ hours, we finally managed to take off. However, during our flight Nice airport was shut down due to bad weather, so we were forced to change course for Marseille. But because of too much head wind, we were eventually forced to turn back and ended up landing in Lyon. We were then given the choice of either flying back to London, or taking a taxi to Nice! Not much of a choice really, as there was no certainty of Nice airport opening the next day… So after much faffing about, we finally got underway, in a downpour of rain. To cut a long story (ride?) short, I arrived in Nice airport about 6 hours later! So having left the office at about 13:30 Friday afternoon, I finally arrived 05:00 Saturday morning – 14 ½ hours later. The joys of business travel, eh ;-)