Saying Goodbye to London

 The time to say goodbye to London and some dear, dear friends finally arrived.  I spent my last week having lunches with lots of friends and wandering around some of the streets which had become so familiar over the last 3.5 years.

In all, I managed to hit 16 countries in my time in Europe, and the magnet board I setup when I first got here is full.















I got to spend an evening with my friend Max and we got to take in a Shisha Pipe over in little Turkey in Dalston. 













It was a fun, if cold evening and a memorable time.

For my last day of work, I got together with a bunch of friends at my favorite Pizza place in Soho, Made in Italy.  They make awesome wood fired pizza. 

 It was a great evening of fun and friends.













For my last big meal, we went to my favorite steak house, Hawkmoor.  Yes, they do great steaks in London.  Our old friend Mark and my friend Nick and his girlfriend Ghislaine joined us for the occasion as they are huge fans of the restaurant.












We had a wonderful meal and a lot to drink, and then it was time to say goodbye.  I hope to see all my friends from London again.  

Monday morning, February 4, came way too early, and it was time to pack everything up.  The trucks to move everything to the crate to ship all of our belongings back to Los Angeles arrived at 9am. 

There was tremendous packing fury, but soon the apartment we'd lived in for 3.5 years was empty. 












Pepper seemed to wander around the apartment wondering where everything went.

 The following day, we took care of a lot of final business.  We turned in our Oyster Cards, and had the dogs cleared for travel at the vet.  We made our way to the airport and had a wonderful final drive by of Big Ben and the buildings of Parliament.

We dropped the dogs off at Virgin Cargo, and got ourselves checked in.   The dogs would be traveling in a heated and pressurized section of the plane.  Their seats were actually a lot more expensive than ours believe it or not.

We splurged a little bit and got premium economy, which made the long, long trip a little more bearable.   Still a long and uncomfortable trip.










Our flight was aptly named 007.  Fun.  It was surprisingly cold on our arrival in LA, but after a bunch of craziness, we tracked down our dogs at Virgin Cargo, cleared them with US customs, and we were all reunited again.