Like wizards, Linde’s are never late. Unlike wizards, Linde’s do not arrive precisely on time. As a rule, Linde’s show up for everything at least two hours early. So, keeping that in mind, I scheduled my taxi from my hotel to St. Pancras Station for four in the morning. After all, I did have to beat the traffic of the morning commute. I arrived precisely three and a half hours early. Perfect. With nothing else to do, I set out exploring.
 
St Pancras railway station, officially known since 2007 as London St Pancras International, is a major central London railway terminus.  It is the station for Eurostar services from Belgium, France, and the Netherlands to London. It provides services to other locations in England, including high-speed trains to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. 
 
The main floor consists of restaurants, gift shops, and even a bookstore. Up the escalator is the outbound trains, including the hub for underground connections. It’s a beautiful structure of glass and concrete, and surely worthy of the ten whole minutes it took to fully explore it. 
 
Curiosity satisfied, I set out to find the men’s restroom.  As I approached, the lines of my mentor, coach, and Master came to mind: “Saint Pancras Station. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We will watch ourselves.” I could not help but wonder if he might have been referring to the Saint Pancras restrooms. 
 
Restroom Review:
Going mostly by smell and cleanliness, I am forced to give this facility a thumbs down.  At least there was soap.
 
 
Time moves remarkably fast when being knocked unconscious and rolled in a train station bathroom. Time literally flew by, and luckily, I came to my senses just in time to catch my train. Remarkably, the would-be thieves cared nothing for my personal possessions, and both the suitcase and backpack were spared.
By my scheduled trip, the station was plenty busy, and getting through customs and to the platform was akin to lining up in 1977 for a Who Concert. Taking great care not to either get trampled or lose my passport, I eventually made it to the platform and the walk to my assigned car.
Which brings up another point, I was expecting a sit-wherever-you-can ride like the ones we experience when taking Amtrak. That is not the case with the EuroStar. Every passenger has an assigned seat, and it is important that you not wait for the last minute to either book it or to climb aboard, as you may not find rack space for your luggage.
 
The Eurostar
Eurostar is an international high-speed rail service in Western Europe, connecting Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. Service began in 1994.
This baby is fast too. It has been clocked at nearly 208 miles per hour but restrains itself on passenger trips, never exceeding 106 (I am forgoing converting this to KPH as the whole conversion joke is beginning to get a little stale). But man-on-man, I would have really loved to have had the engineer open this baby up and see what it could really do.
 
Unlike the floor of the Saint Pancras restroom, where I spent the better part of two hours, the train is clean, modern, and comfortable, and provided one of the most effortless journeys of the entire trip. 
 
Travel time was just over two hours, with less than a half hour spent under the English Channel. Unfortunately, it's a rather dark way down there, and there isn't much of a view. No lurking monsters, no catastrophic cave-ins, and most of all, no pickpockets anywhere. We were out of the darkness before you could say, “Coup de Foudre,” and were now gazing over the scenic countryside where occasionally the tip of a village church steeple would appear peeking out from behind a slight hill.
 
(Little-known fact. Church steeples are the tallest structures in the town; the churches are mostly located in the center of town for a reason. When travelling by foot or horse, a steeple jutting up on the horizon signaled you were close. As for locating them in the center of town, why not? When traveling, who doesn’t want to be where the action is?
 
I knew it and decided to make my way to the club car for a Jambon Beurre (Butter and Ham Sandwich).
Moving on a train as a seventy-one-year-old male is challenging enough, but moving on a bullet moving over 100 MPH qualifies as an Olympic event. Using the back of the seats (an occasional fellow passenger’s head as handrails), I wobbled, pitched, and staggered, making my way to the back of the train. 
Somehow how I managed the trip and was soon back in my seat, stuffing my face with one of France’s most digestible treasures.
I had barely finished my sandwich and Coke when the train arrived on the outskirts of Paris.

Popin’s Grocery answers the age-old question: What if a convenience store actually sold products a human could eat? While larger than a bodega and considerably smaller than your Safeway, you can find pretty much anything you need. Having eaten at restaurants my entire stay, I decided to purchase a few items, take them back to the room, and have one last quiet night before I left for Paris. 
 
Despite the small outward appearance (roughly the same outside dimensions as Doctor Who’s Tardis), it is surprisingly and magically larger inside.  It has to be, just to keep the various assortments and flavors of crisps displayed. 

1. Crisp (definition): 

1.  dessert of fruit baked with a crunchy topping of brown sugar, butter, and flour. "rhubarb crisp"

1.  (BRITISH)  A wafer-thin slice of potato fried or baked until crisp and eaten as a snack; a potato chip.

 
After much soul-searching, I had decided on Tyrrell's Posh Prawn Cocktail Crisps. I have to admit, I was very curious to see if the taste resembled anything that originated from the sea. 
Along with the chips, I purchased:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQRllYCE43c
 
One Coke Zero
One Salami Sandwich
And… seventeen bottles of Ibuprofens with codeine (You can’t get these bad boys in the states, and you never know when you are going to run out).
 
Having everything I needed to sustain myself while repacking my suitcase, I rushed back to the hotel and set to packing for the next part of my adventure. It was still early, and I decided to catch a wee bit of the tele and finally turned on my hotel room flatscreen.
 
I had always thought that England had basically two or three stations. That’s old England, and this is the new. Now they have at least 17,  13 of which are devoted exclusively to James Bond movies, The Avengers reruns, and Jason Statham marathons. As far as I could tell, there was one station dedicated solely to news. I settled for Bond and got to packing.
Total packing time was just under Act 1 of View to a Kill, and as I lay atop my bed, high on Ibuprofen, I thought back on a stay in London which was far too brief. Three and a half days in London is not enough. There’s simply too much to see and do in this great city. I loved it far more than I even expected and, like MacArthur and the Philippines, I promise to return. It truly is a walking town with something to do in every neighborhood and section of the city. The people are considerate, helpful, and a pleasure on every level. If you don’t believe me, come see for yourself. I promise you will have the time of your life. 
 
Crisp Review
 
Now for the important stuff. What the hell do these crisps taste like? After the initial swoosh of opening the airtight bag, I was greeted by a smell that can only be described as, dare I say it, shrimp!  Pardon the metaphor, but I dove right in and was happy to discover that there was a hint of actual shrimp and tomato in every crunchy bite.

Sunday, March 30th, 2025 (Fourth Sunday of Lent/British Mother’s Day) Temperature 63 Fahrenheit/17.22 Celsius. Sunny.
 
Communion: It’s what’s for lunch.
Europe was literally built and civilized around the concept of cathedrals. Before the Catholics, it was the majestic temples of Rome. And way before that, places like Stonehenge where druids blessed the earth and trees, and people danced around naked. You know, like Burning Man but without all the pretension.
 
St. Paul’s was rumored to be built on the same spot that Druids once worshipped. The Catholic Bishops of Rome believed, hell, maybe the locals will not know the difference. And sure enough, a lot of them did not. They just showed up one Sunday morning and instead of hearing about trees, learned about the baby Jesus.
 
Located atop a hill and one of the oldest cathedrals in England, is Saint Paul’s. Once Catholic, it is now the Church of England, and as a baptized Episcopalian, that means I am practically a member. So, betting against the odds that it was no longer there and replaced by ancient tree worship, I decided to pay a Sunday visit. Putting on my slacks, white dress shirt, sweater, and tie, I made my way across town to the historic church that Winston Churchill once attended regularly.
 
The entire Church had been blocked off and encircled by police. Terrorists? Druids? Nope. Turned out they were filming a car chase on the streets directly surrounding the cathedral. And on a Sunday, no less. Positively shameless. A nice constable directed me to a way to get in for service and I wrapped my way around the backside of the structure, cutting through the courtyard and arriving just in time for Sunday services.
The services themselves were conducted under the dome of the cathedral, the attendees seated in, of all things, folding chairs. Ah, call me old-fashioned, but I do so prefer a hard, unforgiving pew with a fold-down kneel bar. The procession, led by a handful of Anglican Priests consisting of both men and women, was followed by a medium-sized choir consisting of boys to men (not the musical group Boys to Men but rather young boys and much older men). The blending of the two distinct vocal types and amplified by centuries-old acoustics while accompanied by the grandest church organ I had ever seen, was unforgettable and, for about ten minutes, actually had me considering going back to church. 
The new testament lesson was read in Zulu (yes, you read that right), with the remainder of the service pretty much in line with what I remembered of childhood Episcopal churchgoing and the movie Zulu directed by Cy Endfield . Not wishing to spoil my lunch, I decided to skip the sacraments and, while the attendees lined up at the altar, instead listened to the choir and basked in the art and ambiance of one of the oldest cathedrals in London.
 
Note: There is one small detail which, believe it or not, did not distract or lessen the overall experience of St. Paul’s. All during the service, the entire chapel was still open for tourists. So, while you worship, you are in a bit of a fishbowl, a line of hundreds of people circling the circumference of the domed sanctuary, ogling you as you come to a weekly peace with your maker. At least they are urged, all these “tourists,” not to disturb the service by taking pictures with their cell phones. Uh, right.
Lunch
Not staying for the car chase, I decided to wend my way down to the Thames and London Bridge. At 11 am on a Sunday, foot traffic in the city was more than I expected, but the journey was quick, and I was soon standing on the bridge, looking off in the distance to the London Tower and Tower Bridge. Deciding to walk along the river, I made my way past the hundreds of tourists and sightseeing boats moored along the river and headed toward the place where such diverse prisoners as Lady Jane Grey, Anne Boleyn, Sir Walter Raleigh, Guy Fawkes, and even Nazi leader Rudolf Hess had been incarcerated. 
Was it the rising balmy temperature in London or the fact that I was still unsure of my unstamped passport that was making me sweat the closer I got to the historic tower?
 
Coco Grill and Lounge
Or
Malt Vinegar Please
 
Apparently, holidays in Europe do not always coincide with the same holidays here in the United States. (Little-known fact: the metric system also happens to be used for some shared holidays. For example, when converted,  American Christmas, December 25, is celebrated on June 12th.
 
Famished from my walk and morning worship, I arrived at the Coco Grill and Lounge, located directly on the river beside the Tower of London and overlooking the Tower Bridge. As stated, it did happen to be Mother’s Day in England, something that I was woefully unaware until I happened to see every mother in the greater London vicinity, lined up and ready for an outside brunch on the Thames. 
Basking in my surroundings and, for London, what was a genuinely balmy day, I ordered Fish & Chips and the traditional drink to accompany my typical British meal, the Mango Mojito. 
As expected, the drink was cold, refreshing, and overpriced. The chips were exceptional, and while the Cod had a golden, crispy crust, the fish itself was rather soggy and bland. Service was very good, with only the constant reminder to review it on Google detracting from the view and my generally great spirits.
 

Museums are conveniently located on almost every corner of England. And to make matters even less complicated, the major ones are completely free. Some do require a pre-register login at a website to prevent overcrowding, which is only a minor inconvenience if you have forgotten your smartphone. These national museums are considered some of the best museums in the entire world, and they have the stolen booty to prove it. 
Egypt called. They want their shit back.
 
It is said that at one time, the sun never set on the British Empire, which must have made it all the more challenging to steal all these precious antiquities during broad daylight.
 
Some of the more notable museums are as follows.
The Natural History Museum
The British Museum
Science Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum
Design Museum
Tate Modern Museum
Imperial War Museum
The Comedy Museum
The Laurence Oliver Museum of Bad Hairpieces.
 
Unfortunately, time was limited, leaving me with the ability to only visit two. I decided on the Science and Natural History Museums, spending about two hours at each. I could have easily spent more time at each, but I still wanted the option to check out the collection of racist noses at the Oliver.
It was a gorgeous day, and both of the museums were only a short walk from where I was dropped off.
The two premier exhibits at the Science Museum were The History of Flight and Computing. Both took up an entire wing, and there was enough there to keep even the most ADHD among us satisfied. There were working replicas of the earliest radar, an extensive collection of World War II model planes, flight suits, and a walk-through, working model of the earliest radar. 
The computing displays were just as interested in examples of the infamous decoding machine from WW3 to examples of the computers that made the blinking light consoles of the old Irwin Allen television shows pale in comparison. 
I also happened to visit the walk-through displays of both a modern and clean working restroom and an overpriced museum café. Both were incredibly real, although for the latter, the food did not seem to capture the true essence of what it means to be edible.
But all the while, something almost as old as time itself was calling me. Whatever this siren was, it was close. I left the computing and aeronautics, stepping out once again into the brisk sunshine.  
 
Dem bones, dem bones were less than a block away.
 
To be honest, I have always had a real hankering to see some dinosaurs, and the exhibit at the Natural History Museum, one of the largest in the world, did not disappoint. This is truly an old-school museum with century-old architecture, grand winding staircases, and, unfortunately for me, six million British schoolchildren who had the same hankering to see some remains of prehistoric giants.  Despite the long and winding lines, the countless bony exhibits were totally worth it. However, be forewarned: if you visit on a weekend, wear earplugs to protect your ears from the thousands of delighted, squealing children.