Europe 2023, September 01

Into September so officially out of summer in the northern hemisphere. Had to get up even earlier to run and have breakfast to get to the airport by 8:30. There wasn't many options for flights except some British Airways ones that were about four times the price, so I picked the next best option that was Easy Jet.

The overnight rain has cleared so I was able to do a short run along the river, but it wasn't much fun running on stone and uneven bricks. Had a rushed breakfast and got to the airport in about 30 minutes with two trains again, really easy. A benefit of buying a daily train ticket yesterday was it lasts for an actual 24 hours from time of purchase, so it was still valid the next morning.

I checked the flight status on the boards and it was delayed by 20 minutes already. Often one delay is just the start of more bad news, but it only got extended out by an additional 5 minutes before leaving.

We landed at Gatwick not too far behind schedule then had to get the shuttle across from the north to south terminal for the London trains. Of course there was London train strikes so only one train every 30 minutes was going direct to London Victoria with no other stops. I might have arrived shortly after the previous train had left so I was close to the front of the queue at least.

The best connecting train on arrival was the Circle line, so of course that was down too - due to not enough staff apparently. Instead I had to get two other short connections, but the great thing about London train is there's so many alternative routes (the opposite of Melbourne).

I got the hotel about an hour early but was able to check-in right away, except I had a crappy room in the lower ground / basement level. I was hearing this really loud rumbling sound every half hour or so, but had no idea if it was a pipes, a bus, or something else. I didn't think the underground trains could possibly be close enough to cause that much noise.

I was quite tired from the travel and didn't have much planned for the afternoon so just went up to Camden Markets. This was much better than Portobello Road markets since it's got dedicated stores away from the main street. There was lots of food stalls, vintage clothing, and other stuff like that.

I got an early dinner and went back to the hotel to make some quick plans for the last day. Soon I came to the conclusion the rumbling sound was in fact coming from the underground train as there's a close station to both the east and west of the hotel on the same line. The vibration was ridiculously loud and regular, but seemed to stop a bit later in the evening, or I was too tired to realise any longer.

The good news was this train line only seems to run on week days, so I didn't have to deal with it again.