Journey mercies and tanned feet: Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Disclaimer: My blog will now begin to seem out of order. Think of it as a little game to figure out the story of my life. In all seriousness, sorry about that. I'm behind. Eventually, you may even get some Haiti posts.

How many modes of transport does it take to get from the downtown Liverpool Hilton to London-Heathrow airport for a flight to NYC? I figured this out and it's much more complicated than one would imagine. Why was I in Liverpool anyways? My good friend Caroline married a Liverpoolian(?), Philip, on May 29th. I was thrilled to attend the wedding and had an amazing time. While living in London, I became fascinated with the idea of an English wedding. I saw so many pictures and I felt for sure it was something I needed to participate in. What I found most exciting was the almost expectation that female guests should wear a hat / hairpiece. Picture Four Weddings and a Funeral, Three Men and a Little Lady, etc. It's a marvelous idea. For a while, I was hoping to find an English husband just so I could have an English wedding, with hats. I would even pop into House of Fraser or John Lewis (large UK department stores) on occasion to see the selection.

So, as you can imagine, I was very happy to attend this wedding to support and congratulate Caroline and Philip and to sport a very-stylish head ornament. Emma, one of my closest friends, came to the wedding as well. We had a good time, and I must say, if you are ever in need of a wedding DJ, Philip and Caroline Gilbertson are your team. The music was right up my alley. Back to the planes, trains and automobiles, I had a 5:15pm flight to NYC from London-Heathrow the day after the wedding. Since Liverpool and London are a short 176 miles apart, 9.5 hours seemed like plenty of time to make my flight. See trip details:

Beginning at 7:30 AM (the morning after an entertaining wedding, I might add)

1) Leave Hilton hotel for Liverpool Lime Street train station (by taxi)

2) Leave Liverpool Live Street station for a suburban train station as main train line was under repairs (Shuttle bus)

3) Leave suburban train station for Manchester airport station (train)

4) Leave Manchester Airport for London-Gatwick (Note BA strike into LHR) (plane)

5) Leave London-Gatwick station for London-Victoria station (train)

6) Leave London-Victoria station for Emma's flat - Borough to pick up bags (taxi)

7) Leave Emma's flat -Borough for Paddington train station to pick up LHR train (taxi)

8) Leave Paddington train station for London-Heathrow airport (train)

9) ARRIVE London-Heathrow for JFK flight at 4pm. Flight 5:15

To recap. Taxi-bus-train-plane-train-taxi-taxi-train-airport! What a day!?!

Caroline and I during the cocktail hour

Emma and I (note hairpiece!)

As usual, I got to do some other fun things while in London including seeing lots of friends, attending a hen-do (English bachelorette) for my friend Serena, birthday lunch for Annabel, a visit to the Tearfund office, high tea at Sketch, Enron the musical, Jon Mayer concert with Jennifer and Eunice and Sex and the City 2.