Surprise! It's not the end of the trip!
The weather in Manchester that morning was sunny, but at Heathrow it was very foggy. The rate of planes that could land was cut in half, and long haul flights from all over the globe had precedence. British Airways loaded us onto the plane in Manchester in hopes that would improve our landing slot, but no joy. We sat there for three hours. By the time we landed at Heathrow the sun was out and our plane to San Diego was first in line to take off.
Inside the terminal was chaos, lines a hundred people long with two agents at the front slowly rebooking. We got in a line that had snaked to a spot where an airport staffer was annoyed, because it blocked another queue they were managing. People were confused, cutting across our line to get to the other line, people were making up conflicting queues (you go here, they go there, no they go here, you go there...). Chaos.
A phone message came in. It was Sunday. We had been rebooked by the British Airways robot for the Wednesday San Diego flight, same seats.
Now normally a three-day delay would be a crisis, we would be fretting about work, obligations and the like. I would be on the phone working to get us a flight sooner. But now... hey... we don't have much better to do, and we're in London. Sure, Wednesday.
It was possible to get our bags, but a hassle. It would be easiest to just leave them to be put on our Wednesday flight. Now that we were Mr. & Mrs. flexible we said sure, no worries.
So with our just our daypacks we found a cafe, relaxed and retooled. I found a hotel in Kensington. We stopped by Boots and got toothbrushes. Next stop Uniqlo for some underwear, a shirt and some socks.
We ate at Indian restaurants, because the South Asian food in London is so much better than San Diego.
Dishoom in particular was good.
We revisited Kew gardens. The last time we were there Chihuly sculptures were on display, this time it was Moore.
We went to the main V&A museum. Here I am on the 4th floor with the ceramics study hall to myself.
We walked Portobello Road and bought a cookbook at Books for Cooks. It was a fun couple of days! It also gave us a chance to transition from canal life back to city life.
Our Wednesday flight to San Diego was on time and uneventful, which was good. We were both now ready to come back home.