minimunchkin: Munchkins in London

The kids and I went on a big adventure this summer, traipsing around London for 3 1/2 weeks and ten days around Paris. Shad would join us for the last 10 days of our trip back in London. I'd been looking forward to this trip for over a year, having cancelled our plans last year because of Mia's illness. So now one year later, we were finally setting off on our big adventure. As I stuffed the last of our clothes into the suitcase the night before our flight, the nerves kicked in. "Four weeks on the road with two monkeys on my own, am I crazy??" Well, it was too late to change my mind now. Eight hours later (plus four trips to the loo during the night due to anxiety poo as Shad called it!), we were on our way.

One last cuddle for Daddy before we leave. Poor Ryan cried all the way to the boarding gate :(

Advantage of waking up at 4.30am to catch an early morning flight - zonked out pretty soon after take off

Unfortunately this little one was up for almost the entire flight!

So very happy to see Yee Chai, especially Mama after that long long flight!

Not I'm not dreaming, we're really in London... although my son did wonder why the buses have no windows like his toy London bus :)

So excited to ride in a "black colour taxi"

Some people say that kids do not experience jet-lag... well they lie! We arrived in London sometime around 3pm local time which was 10pm back in Hong Kong. Both kids were in great spirits during our train then taxi ride back to Tania's place. Ryan was very excited from the moment we stepped off the plane, he didn't even complain about the five flights of stairs (around 80 steps!) we had to walk up to get to Tania's apartment. My plan was to try and keep them awake for as long as I could in order to minimise the effects of the time change. Well, easier said than done. By 5pm, Ryan decided he'd had enough and curled up on Tania's bed after a mini temper tantrum and promptly fell asleep. Mia however managed to stay awake until around 8pm so I naively thought that I would be able to get a good night's sleep. Naive is the word, both of them woke up at 3am!

Who needs an alarm clock when we have these two? Poor Yee Chai got woken up 4 hours earlier than her normal time.

View from outside Tania's living room window

Didn't take the kids long to feel right at home

My half eaten dinner, now my delicious breakfast. This was some of the tastiest Indian food I've had in a long time.

Since the kids were already up, I decided to take them for a short ride on a London bus, nothing too tiring just out to Oxford Circus and back. We only got as far as Selfridges and I decided it was time to get off and get a cab home instead. Two stops after we got on, we had to move seats because a drunk guy got on and sat down next to us. Not what I wanted for their first London experience, especially when Ryan kept wanting to know why the guy was so smelly.

Strolling along Wymering Avenue

Always time for a cuddle

"Let's call Daddy". A little difficult when he won't even step into the booth because it was stinky!

Waiting for Bus No. 6

Jet lag started to set in pretty soon. Little Miss Sunshine turned into Little Miss Grumpy and don't let that smile on Ryan's face fool you. The very next minute we had a mini fit. Thank goodness Mama was wise enough not to give in to the call of her tummy for a salt beef sandwich at Selfridges and instead got sandwiches from Pret-A-Manger to eat on the go as we headed home. But to be fair, even I was feeling terribly tired by then.

If we can't enter Selfridges for their salt beef sandwich, we can at least take a photo in front of it

Day two and another 3am start to the day! Looked out of the window and the weather was perfect. Cool but sunny, perfect for a day out at the zoo. We took the water bus from Little Venice and the kids loved watching the ducks while we waited for our ride to arrive.