As I get ready for my upcoming trip to London I have been doing my homework and stumbled across this video that is a great overview of the monuments in London that are related to the great London fire.

Starting at Monument and winding along the streets of the city towards Spitalfields, this walk follows the journey of the fire of 1666 through some of the most atmospheric spots in London.

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London’s Heathrow Airport opened its new terminal five to great fan fare. The new terminal is state of the art and will be the new home of all the British Air flights into London. The implementation of the Open Skies treaty was even delayed so this terminal could be finished. Work on this terminal (including planning) has been going on for 20 years. But, the terminal opening has been plagued with problems.

In the chaos that is terminal 5 at least 430 flights have been cancelled and 20,000 bags have been lost in the first week of operation.

According to the International Herald Tribune:

About 6 percent of the baggage British Airways has handled in the past four days still has yet to reach its owners, the spokeswoman said. The carrier, Europe’s third-biggest, is already Europe’s worst airline for lost luggage and the second-worst for delayed bags, according to the Air Transport Users Council.

The term national embarrassment has been used by the British Press. The Times Online has published a web site with a game where you too can be a baggage handler at Heathrow to see just how hard it is. I see the problem, either the game was broken or it was a good simulation of the problem as I was not able to deliverer a single bag.

To make matters worse for the Heathrow reputation, Time published a story recently about the the number of homeless who have taken up residence in the airport and the Sun published a story that 4 cups of coffee at Heathrow can cost up to £361,514.97.

The new terminal was built at a cost of 4.3 billion pounds which is over 11,894 cups of coffee. So if they can sell 11,890 more they can pay off the whole project.

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There is no truth to the rumor that the way my wife and I figured out the itinerary for our next vacation was that we consulted TripAdvisor’s recent survey to figure out which are the dirtiest cities in Europe. It is true however that both London (#1) and Athens (tied with Rome for #3) which we plan to visit are on that list. To make matter’s worse Athens, since being voted #3, is having a garbage strike.

According to World Hum:

If the survey had been done this week, however, Greece’s capital might have made first place. Garbage collectors have been on strike for days, as part of a nationwide union protest against government pension reforms.

The garbage hills are not quite mountain-sized yet, as they were last year when the city landfill was overflowing. But the rot is stinking up the early spring air and prompting breathless television reports declaring the streets “apocalyptic”, a la Naples. Striking workers are even pelting police with the garbage during demonstrations.

It sort of the ruins the mood when youre out for a $10 (and climbing) fancy coffee at an outdoor cafe.

Sadly, Athens didn’t make any good TripAdvisor lists, i.e. best cuisine or most romantic. The cleanest city was apparently Zurich, though it was also voted one of the most boring. But clean doesn’t always mean boring: London was voted the dirtiest city, but also the city with the best nightlife.

Zurich being the cleanest city I can easily imagine. Those of you who listen to the Amateur Traveler may remember that in episode 100 I talked about going to Zurifast. The huge crowd had scattered garbage, broken bottles etc everywhere by 5 AM. Magically by 10 AM the city was already Swiss clean. Those guys are efficient.

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Picture this, you are minding your own business as a tourist on the streets London when suddenly and without warning the crowd around you stops moving, freezing in place.

The day London froze. Inspired by Improv Everywhere and made a reality by 100’s of volunteers. At exactly 3:30pm on a secret cue, almost everyone in the square froze. The few bewildered tourists didn’t know what was happening. For 5 minutes the participants held their positions, and then magically everyone unfroze.

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In a scene right out of the movie The Terminal a man has been living in one of the London airports. Unlike the movies, this story does not, at least not yet, have a happy ending.

A homeless chef was locked up today after making Gatwick airport his home for THREE years.

“Cheeky” Anthony Delaney ate, showered and slept at the busy airport, brushing off security staff who stopped him more then 30 times.

He told his lawyers he was happier staying there because he was “clean, dry and warm”.

In fact he rarely left the busy south terminal, popping out only occasionally to collect his Jobseeker’s Allowance, the court was told.

In scenes reminiscent of the Steven Spielberg movie The Terminal, Delaney passed his days watching holidaymakers and airline staff going about their business.

A court was told he did not suffer mental health problems, was neither a drug nor alcohol addict, and did not cause “a stink”.

Popularity: 47% [?]