London Day 1 - Munich International Airport to London Heathrow

10/27/2012

It was our last day in Munich and we were sad to leave Hotel Andra and its wonderful breakfast. Hell, it's so good that Dad goes down for TWO breakfasts (either that, or he's just really hungry). He'll go down by himself before we're up, read the newspapers and eat a light meal, come up, then go down with us again for his real breakfast. 

They have various pastries and cakes for breakfast, croissant and caprese, smoked salmon, scrambled eggs, sunny side up eggs, egg pancake with ham, prosciutto, lots of different types of cheese, tea, hot chocolate (better than Café Tomaselli!), and best of all, their breads were really good. There were poppyseed ones, sesame, pumpkin seed with various others, Kaiser rolls… sigh.

And London’s hotel is 21 pounds for breakfast. Boo.

We weren’t sad, however, to leave the cramped room behind. The room really should have been for 2 adults, but they advertised it as for 4 by filling in the empty space with single mattresses. It was super cramped and we were always piling on top of one another. But still, the service was excellent (the night watchman pulled a beer can opener out of his pocket before Mom even asked for it! She was really happy about that… as well as the fact that he was cute ^.^). 

The subway ticket from the Hauptbahnhof to Munich International Airport is usually around 9 euros per person. But they offer a partner Airport-City-Day Ticket, so for a grand total of 20 euros, 5 adults can travel together. You need to buy the ticket at the self-service ticket machines at the train station (red) and they don’t need to be validated as they are only available on the day of use… so if you buy in advance, then you’ll be stuck with a useless ticket. I kept trying to check out, but finally realized that the MVV system (for trams, S-bahn and U-bahn) only takes cash. It is the same ticket machine for the train system and the train takes credit card. Why can’t they do as well?! S1 and S8 both take you to Flughafen/Airport, but S1 separates at one point in two different directions, so we thought to play it safe and go on the S8 instead. They come relatively frequently, but it takes around 30-40 minutes to reach the airport.

Munich International (MUC) is huge. There are two terminals, and we were departing from Terminal 2, which means you have to go up the escalators, walk through the big building, walk through a massive open-air concourse (with a glass half-roof) to reach the terminal, then go up another set of escalators to reach the check-in counter. Lufthansa has all these kiosks along the way for you to self-check-in.  Apparently they don’t check you in anymore at the counter; it is meant only as a bag drop-off point. You are expected to check-in at the kiosks first—you scan your passport and the flight info for all the passengers on your ticket shows up. Pretty awesome, hunh? Until you realize that you still have to scan all their passports in as well… kind of redundant, no? All our frequent flyer info popped up (I inputted it in when I bought the tickets) and then the boarding passes printed out at the kiosks. You take your boarding pass, get into the line for bag drop-off and they double-check everything is good to go, then you go thru security. 

I thought we just ate breakfast!

We drank all our water before entering security, thinking we could refill afterwards. There are no water fountains in the airport whatsoever! The flight was 2 hours and extremely shaky, even though it was clear and sunny skies all the way. I think the pilot was in training or something. When we were landing, it felt like we were riding on a roller coaster. The wing would tip right then left, then right and left, and everybody was kind of nervously laughing. Seriously. Everyone on the plane! Then a man decided he was going to stand up and get his luggage, and a crew member had to use the microphone to remind us passengers to sit down… ahem, meaning him! He didn’t get the message however, and la-di-da, still went about collecting his luggage. The lady repeated it again, this time specifically telling him to sit down, and when he did, the whole cabin applauded.

Upon descending the escalators to baggage claim, there was a sign for Heathrow Express and a man standing there with a portable credit card machine for passengers who wanted to buy tickets. I went to buy them while Dad got our luggage. If you get the Group Weekender Pass, it’s a 50% discount per person. Normally 19 pounds per person, if you travel on a weekend in a group of 4 or more, it’s 9.5 pounds per person. So come to London on a weekend (if you’re traveling via Heathrow)! It’s a breeze to get the ticket. Our baggage came out really early, and we were already super early to the airport (fast, crazy driving on the pilot’s part), so we lugged everything to the platform for Heathrow Express and hopped on 3 minutes later. So far, easy go.

BUT.

We arrived at Paddington Station only to find out that over HALF the subway lines were closed for engineer work. And Circus Line, one of the main lines, was closed ALTOGETHER. WTF. This happened the last time we were in London as well. So you have to replan your route. It was really confusing which lines were closed and which weren’t, so to save time, I asked the ticket person who gave us excellent directions. However, she failed to mention that most of these subway stops are via stairs only. Several flights of stairs, in fact. Angel and I both forgot we were lugging large suitcases up and down London’s subway the last time and so failed to warn our parents. Which might be a good thing, because ignorance is bliss? Ha. 

From Paddington, we lugged the suitcases up 2 flights of stairs and down 2 flights (London’s subway is the most basic kind—one platform going one direction, a flight of stairs separates the two platforms, and the other platform going the other direction. No elevators. No escalators. No wonder they’re all so skinny. 

Changed trains at Earl’s Court (a very confusing change of direction—there’s only a minute warning before the train arrives telling you which platform to be on… you can see people moving from one platform to the other). Changed trains at Victoria to Pimlico, and out of all the stations—you would think Paddington’s the largest, followed by Victoria and Earl’s Court—tiny Pimlico was the only one with escalators. Well, Earl’s Court had one elevator but it was a tight squeeze. No wonder they’re doing all this construction… hopefully, it’s to install escalators or I have no idea why they would be closing so many lines for construction work. Victoria Station is still under construction (as it was 2 years earlier). It was another 10 minute walk to the hotel from Pimlico and you could tell Dad wasn’t very happy. He was dragging along… until…

Check out Dad eating his cookie in the background!

Upon checking in at the Doubletree, we were given their signature hot walnut chocolate chip cookies. 1 for each person. Angel and Daddy immediately dug into them, gobbling them up before I was even done checking in! I turned around, and saw the two of them… it was hilarious. Like father, like daughter. :P I got a nice picture of the two of them polishing off their cookies. Mom and I didn’t eat them… Mom doesn’t like chocolate chips and I don’t like walnuts.

The London Doubletree at Westminster hotel is $400/night but they had a summer sale so the hotel room was $165/night when I booked. I had to book 2 rooms as London is like Paris, a city desperately in need of space. Most hotel rooms can only fit 2 adults and they will charge more for additional people in the room. That works out to be $1600 total before tax at the regular rate. We paid $200 TOTAL out of pocket for the rooms. Sweet!

After we settled in a bit, Mom, Angel and I went out hunting for Marks and Spencer and Sainsbury’s. The hotel has free wifi, and Mac computers in each room with a wide screen monitor, so Angel was able to map out the nearest ones at Victoria Station. 

We walked by the hotel we stayed in last time *sigh* love you, Park Plaza! Walked by Billy Elliot at the Victoria Palace and Wicked, two musicals that were showing last time and still going strong, apparently. Sainsbury’s moved locations, and it resembles Grocery Outlet Bargain Market now. Kind of a big warehouse experience. Didn’t really like the feel of it. Also, they package everything like Target, instead of the fresh grocery experience we remembered from last time. 

Angel made a mad dash to Sainsbury’s… she’s been thinking of their flapjacks for the better part of two years. After trying to make them many, many times, she finally gave up, just waiting to get to London to eat them. Poor baby was in for a sad disappointment. Sainsbury’s doesn’t sell a whole lot of fresh baked goods anymore. The chocolate covered yummies used to be 2 bars for like 1 pound. Now, they have packaged flapjacks and they aren’t chocolate covered. AND to add insult to injury, they are bite-sized pieces! But one box was only 1.25 pounds for 18 pieces (only if you buy 2 though) and so we bought one box of those and one box of caramel shortbread. OMG they were so delicious!!!! We ate half of each box in one go!

At Victoria Station, we took Mom to the pasty shop where we bought hot meat pies last time. Tonight, we bought a large beef & potatoes one for Dad and a beef & Stilton for ourselves. It was yummy… but I can’t help think that we make it a lot better now ourselves. I’ve been dreaming of them for so long, but in the meantime, I learned to make them and I guess I make it more to my own tastes now. :T 

It was sprinkling pretty heavily and nightfall came early… Europe is turning into winter! Munich was supposed to snow today, but just rained instead. And London is cold too, not as cold as Munich (which is get-into-your-bones-chilling) even though they are the same degree (8-9 Celsius). Our consensus is the wind factor. And tonight is the start of British Daylight Savings, so we gained an hour of sleep. Yippee!