Travel Tips

This page is for sharing travel tips and updating trip     information.  Most of those enrolled for the trip are seasoned travellers, and my co-counselor, Linda Woolf, is a travel genius.  Sharing our collective wisdom ought to amply prepare us to get the most out of our 9 days together in England!

Passports Weather Money Pouch Money Personal Security
Flights Time Credit Cards Currency Exchange Packing
Hotels Phone Medicines Travel Books Defeating Jetlag
Bus/Tube        

Passports  
Please make sure your passport is valid for 6 MONTHS past your return flight dateThis appears to be a post-911 security rule, and our travel agent has confirmed it.

Money Pouch
It's smart to carry your passport and money in one of those slim pouches made to wear around your neck and under clothing.  Keep important documents and most of your money in your moneybelt.  Keep only one day’s cash in your pocket or wallet.  Don’t let others see you access your moneybelt.

Personal Security Measures
Make two copies of your passport, driver’s license, airline tickets/confirmations, credit cards, itinerary, and important addresses.  Give one copy to a friend at home who gets e-mail and put one copy in your daypack or locked suitcase.  The originals go in your moneybelt.  Lock your suitcase after you get off the plane.  Combination locks can be found at WalMart or any travel store.

Weather
Take a raincoat and small umbrella and expect lows in the 40s, highs in the 60s.  Here's a link for the 5-day London forecast. http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day_f.shtml?world=0008 

This one is in Fahrenheit, but over there it will usually be reported in Celsius.
68 deg F is 20 deg C  (the high for May 23-24, 2004)
50 deg F is 10 deg C (the low for May 24-25, 2004)

Flights
Tuesday, June 1:
For all of us, our transatlantic flight is Continental #028, departing Newark at 8:30 pm, arriving London Gatwick 8:15 am June 2.  To change your seat assignment, call Continental at
1-800-523-3273.

Huntsville-Newark is Continental #2084, leaving HSV 3:35 pm, arriving Newark 7:00 pm.

For those returning June 9, the transatlantic flights are all Continental.
Huntsville travellers: #035 departing London Gatwick at 9:30 a.m., arriving Houston 1:40 pm.  (Connection is Continental #2360 arriving Huntsville 5:25 pm, June 9.)

Other travellers, these may not be the latest flight details, so call Continental and reconfirm!
Atlanta travellers: Continental #019 departing London Gatwick at 10:30 am, arriving Newark 1:20 pm.  (Connection is Continental #1151 arriving Atlanta 6:02 pm, June 9.)
Cleveland traveller: Continental #067 departing London Gatwick 11:55 am, arriving Cleveland 3:25 pm, June 9.

Hotels
Our London hotel is the Royal National on Bedford Way in Bloomsbury, June 2-6 & 7-9
Click here for a location map.  Passports sent us the following hotel contact info:
Phone: 011.44.207.637.24.88
Fax: 011.44.207.837.46.53

Note: these are expressed for calling from the USA. In the UK, you would leave off 011 and 44.

The hotel in St. Ives is Chy-an-Albany Hotel (June 6-7 only)
Albany Terrace, St. Ives, Cornwall. TR26 2BS
Phone: 011.44.1736.79.67.59  info@chyanalbanyhotel.com
Fax: 011.44.1736.79.55.84

Bus/Tube
Passports has arranged all the ground transport for our scheduled excursions, including transport to and from the airport.  But there is lots of free time in our schedule, including every evening.  London transport by bus and tube (subway) is easy and convenient.  I've mailed each of you a London bus & tube map that Passports sent. The London Transport website has lots of information about the system, including special cards you can buy that save money and time.  You can buy a card that's good for bus & tube in  central London only (zone 1).  For this, you may need to have a passport sized photo. You can make a photo in a booth there, or bring your own photos ready to use.

Time
England (and most of western Europe) is 6 hours ahead of Central Daylight time, 5 hours ahead of Eastern Daylight time.  That means when you call home from there, it will be 5 or 6 hours earlier.

Phone
To order a travel cell phone for the trip, go to http://www.travelcell.com
It's about $30/week, plus 69 cents a minute for calls within the UK (89 cents for calls to US), and no charge for receiving calls.  My travel cell phone is being delivered May 27.  I'll let you know the number when I get it.  Billing starts from the day you arrive in the foreign country.

I recently updated my home phone to get an international rate of 8 cents a minute to the UK (it costs me $3.95 a month). 

To make an international call from the U.S., dial 011 and then the country code.  The UK country code is 44.

Money
England still uses the pound, though you can also use Euros.  Both are on the decimal system.  There are 100 pence (p) to the pound. Common coins are 5 p, 10 p, 20 p, 50 p, 1 pound.  Paper money starts with the 5 pound note (there may still be some paper 1 pound notes around, but I doubt it.)  It's tempting to think of these like dollars, since they are on the decimal system, but it's deceptive.  Their 50 p coin is worth slightly less than $1.

On May 21, 2004,  it cost $1.77 to buy a pound. Put another way, $1 = 56 p

A Euro cost $1.19 that same day, so that's closer to a 1:1.   

You can check current exchange rates here x-rates.com

Credit Cards
Be sure to notify your credit card/ATM card company that you will be using the card in England from June 1 through June 9.  Get their emergency number (NOT an 800 number, which won’t work). If you only have one card, you might want to get another one.  Foreign ATMs sometimes eat bankcards. Be sure your PIN is only four digits.

Currency Exchange
The best way to change money in Europe is with an ATM card rather than travellers checks.  There's a fee every time you cash a travellers check, whereas when you use an ATM machine, it comes out in the local currency with very little fee.  If you don't already have an ATM card, get one from your bank.  It's also helpful to have a credit card with a PIN number that lets you get a cash advance.  This is more expensive than getting money from your ATM (that money comes from your checking account), but if you lose the ATM or something goes wrong with it, the credit card cash advance is a backup (plus that money is borrowed, not in your checking account).

Defeating Jet Lag
1. Flight attendants recommend a 2-hour nap on arrival, then get up and go the rest of the day.

2. Linda has an excellent method involving sleep and diet:
    a. Don't fast but eat very little food the day before the flight, and drink 4-8 glasses of water from lunch until dinner. Eat dinner at 5 P.M. and lunch at 11 A.M. On the day of your flight repeat these steps until your flight time.

b. Two days prior to your flight make sure EVERYTHING is in order so you won't have to suffer on the last evening going to stores and packing.

c. The night before your flight go to sleep at 8 P.M and wake up the next morning at 4 or 5. Yes, this may seem early, but you will sleep better on the plane. Stay up the entire day without naps.

d. Stop drinking caffeine or alcohol 48 hours prior to the flight. Have a solid week of good nights' sleep (8-10 hours).

e. On the flight take off your shoes and don't overeat.

f. Go to sleep after the dinner service.

g. Turn on the classical music or jazz channel while you sleep and use eyeshades.

h. Get a neck pillow and use the airline's blanket.
For the return trip, do the same except keep the window shade open and go to sleep at 11 P.M and wake up at 5 A.M so you can sleep on the plane.

Why take drugs? This is natural and it will work for almost anyone. (However, I take No Jet Lag or a sleep med just in case.)

3. Rose found a method called "twirling" (see the book about this). The idea is that moving so fast for long periods gets our bodies out of synch with the earth’s magnetic field.  Twirling in the opposite direction is supposed to adjust it.  Below are directions for  travel West to East, e.g., U.S.A. to Europe.  Reverse it for travel East to West. In the directions, left hand is east; right hand is west.

  1. Stand with arms extended straight out from the sides.
  2. Turn right palm up, left palm down.
  3. Twirl at a moderate rate clockwise until you’re pretty dizzy.
  4. Lie down and relax.

Packing
Choose travel clothes made of quick drying and wrinkle free fabrics.  Carry a spray bottle to fill with water to remove packing wrinkles.

Medicines
Keep prescription medicines in the container they came in.  For critical medicines (like blood pressure pills), take two sets and keep them separate in case you lose one (one in your purse or carry-on, one in your suitcase).  It's a very good idea to ask your doctor for a prescription to take along with you.  While you're at it, get your doctor to prescribe a broad-spectrum antibiotic, just in case, and Diflucan for any resultant yeast infection.  If you have any special medical conditions, ask for a letter to any foreign doctor describing the medical condition and listing any prescriptions (the generic terms) you take daily.  Include your blood type.

Travel Books  
About Traveling -
Linda Woolf recommends Laura Vestanen's Travel Tips for the Sophisticated Woman, a book of practical tips including excellent advice about packing to  avoid wrinkles.  It's also a fun read, very opinionated, e.g., wearing black is good, wearing khaki or t-shirts with pockets is not!

About London - Eyewitness London is a nice size, very durable, not too heavy, and includes lots of great maps.

About Woolf and London - you can't do better than the book required for those taking the class for credit, Virginia Woolf's London: A Guide to Bloomsbury and Beyond (New York: Tauris Park, 2000), previously published as Virginia Woolf: Life and London (1987).  The books are identical except for the cover.  It's Woolf's biography as told in terms of places she lived, and it includes interesting walking tours in London at the end.

 

Return to England in the Footsteps of Virginia Woolf