Ireland day 0940. Thursday 25 April 2024- Flying Visit *

Ireland day 0940. Thursday 25 April 2024- Flying Visit

Today’s summary	Caught an early morning flight to Stansted and then travelled across London for a lunchtime meeting with former work colleagues at the Lensbury club in Teddington. Returned from Gatwick to Dublin in the evening. A long day but very enjoyable to catch up with people I hadn’t seen for many years.
Today’s weather	Cool and bright in the morning, rain later. Moderate westerly wind. Appx 12c

Today’s overview location (The green mark shows the location of my route)		Close-up location (The orange line shows where I walked) (Click button below to download GPX of today’s walk as recorded, or see interactive map at bottom with elevations corrected): Teddington to Lensbury

Commentary

(Summary blog only. Last full blog was Day 0368).

Every year, a group of colleagues from the company I used to work with in the 1980s and 90s get together for a social lunch. They meet in the “Lensbury” – an up-market sports club on the Thames at Teddington. I last went 5 or 6 years ago – well before the pandemic – but in the intervening years I’ve been too busy or had diary clashes. I decided to put that right today, and make a flying visit to London to see how everyone was getting on.

This of course meant an early start – 6am from Malahide to catch a 7:55 flight to Stansted. The journey went well – flights, trains and the Underground all connected smoothly and I was at Lensbury in good time for the 1pm start.

I enjoyed the lunch very much. Although most of the attendees were retirees slightly older than myself (the oldest was a sprightly 98), all were in good spirits and doing interesting things. The time flew and it was soon time say goodbyes and retrace my steps to Dublin – well, not quite as I came back via Gatwick – and to a resumption of our Irish explorations.

The homeward journey went straightforwardly and Val picked me up at the airport just before 10pm. It’s been a long but rewarding day – I’ll sleep well tonight, I think.

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


Irish essentials on sale at Dublin airport this morning – sausages and tea for all those far-flung cousins!	Sunrise over Lambay Island just visible through teh window

Bus transfer at Stansted airport always a bit of a pain – but worked smoothly enough today. By the way the blue sky didn’t last – I was raining by the afternoon!	Stansted Express direct to Liverpool Street

Waterloo and City Line – AKA “The Drain”	Iconic clock-cum-meeting place at Waterloo station

Decorative post box in Teddington!