Now the beauty of days out in the United Kingdom is the cheaper travel on trains if you travel in a group of at least four people. This is called GroupSave. We seriously recommend that you Google GroupSave to see what else you can experience. A typical off-peak return ticket costs about £15.00 per person. Now make use of GroupSave which is in simple terms, four people travel for the price of two… a massive saving!

As you can read from the headline, we made our way like so many other people to Brighton. The atmosphere on the beach is amazing and it’s close to the train station. The pier is a massive attraction to those who can not sit still on the beach for long periods of time. The sea is calm and can be a bit cold but that does not stop people from splashing about. It’s a pebble beach….yup, stones! Mind you, it is quite comfortable and you will be thankful that everything is not covered in sand at the end of the day.

Do yourself a favour; take sunscreen as the sun can be quite unforgiving most of the time. A small cooler bag is ideal if you do not fancy paying through your ears for drinks and food on the beachfront.  You can buy a cheap beach umbrella at B&Q for around £8.00, a definite good idea if you are intending on spending the whole day there. Brighton has a great feel to it, the atmosphere is vibrant and exciting, what is not to like?

A lot of soul searching and hard grafting has been done and we are now in the process of buying a house in London. Never thought that would be possible after 5 years and a bit of debt build up but we made it through. We are classed as first time buyers and the whole process can be a bit daunting but it will serve as an excellent guide on this website once we have the keys in our hands.

Buying a house in London may not necessary be your cup of tea but you would still be interested to know what your options are when you live in London. We have done the house-sharing, the renting of the own flat and hopefully soon we would get the keys and complete the next step.

It has been four days now and I have seen light coming from the carrot seed tub. You are going to laugh at this but I used one of those clear containers you tend to buy a leg of lamb in the supermarket. Obviously it has been cleaned properly before I used it and it is big enough to be a home for my carrots. The carrots will not be big but will do as baby carrots. I will be trying my hand later during the year at garlic, so stay tuned for that.

Ok, I realise that this update is a little sad but it shows you that you can plant food in your windowsills in London, even though there is no space. The summer of 2010 will be a green one as I will plant ten times more than this year!

I have joined a local forum where people living in my area have come together to make a change, little changes though but a change non the less. Ever since joining the forum I have felt a strange sense of belonging and I urge everyone coming to London to blend into the local community to make the area better. This is needed unless we want a crime ridden area where people are too scared to be themselves or live in their own area. Think about it!

The community spirit really does wonders for an area. By supporting the locals, voicing your opinion and to meet up every now and then all play a vital role in society. I am not much for meeting strangers in the townhall but I am willing to lend a hand to clean up the area or even to visit and support a local fair. What possitive changes can you bring to your community?

That is it! I am done with sightseeing in London, well, the walking part that is. Wait a minute; I’ve become way too lazy in this wonderful city. I have taken the time to explore Marble Arch, Hyde Park, St James Park, and Buckingham Palace… straight back to Waterloo. What a day it has been and we walked all the way.

Here it is folks, a few photos of the day out in London. Seriously, go and explore Hyde Park, it is humongous and there is so much to do.

Marble Arch

Hyde Park – Boat House

A view in Hyde Park

Princess Diana Memorial

Serpentine Lake

Yep, you guessed it. I am a big softie and I am trying to change the world, well, I am trying. Earlier this week I watched a show on BBC about homelessness in London and what they go through. This made me think a lot about the subject because I for one do not want to become homeless ever as it must be a bad place to be in your life. One thing does bug me about homeless people and I suppose the few bad apples give them the bad rep they carry around with them. Whenever you dig into your pockets and hand someone money, they end up splurging it on either booze or drugs and that makes me furious as to why so I give away my hard earned money?

 Anyway, thinking about the show made me realise just how cruel people can be and that we should really try to make a difference in someone’s lives even if it is just temporary. There are hundreds of homeless people living in London and so many more from Europe end up on the streets in the hunt for a better life. I always tend to see large groups of men in summer time sleep in the small park close to my work. There is a smaller group that tend to sleep on the church steps from time to time. Then I get to see something good happen at other times where a charity delivers food and a hot drink to these homeless people at around 7am in front of Charing Cross Police Station.

I still have mixed feelings about homelessness but that would not stop me from buying someone food if they ask me for it but they won’t see a penny!

A hidden treasure was discovered in Central London a couple of weeks back whilst doing another round of sightseeing. Yep, believe it or not, we still have a lot of sightseeing ground to cover, even five years later and there is always something new popping up. London is really amazing in that respect as it is ever-evolving into something new and exciting. This hidden treasure was in the famous Trocadero Centre in Piccadilly Circus.

The Trocadero Centre is already famous for housing a massive arcade on three floors, a bowling alley, sports bar and cinema. Ripley’s Believe it or Not moved into the building recently and tourists and locals have been enjoying the Rainforest Café for years. Now Trocadero opened their doors to Gamersbase where people can sit in pure “gamers luxury” and play on their networks and their games. Gamersbase have teamed up with HMV and boy is the setup sweet.

Whether you love playing LAN games or just curious about the latest games coming out before buying them, pop down there and give it a whirl. This set up is perfect for people who want to meet more gamers or test out games without forking out a fortune for it. If you have ever played in a LAN, you will know that it is great and not to be missed.

Yup, the impossible has officially been done, mark this day! As most Londoners know, travelling to any of London’s airports in the middle of the night can be quite costly because the Underground terminates at 01:00 and so do the trains. You will need to rely completely on night busses or by booking a taxi to get there. Now, the night busses can be a bit scary at night so if you decide to take our advice, please take caution.

The Night Busses in London start at around 01:00 each morning and most of them will run twice within the hour. I would check the information on the bus stop before taking that as gospel as it might change in the future. When using Night Busses, I would avoid sitting way at the back all alone; sit closer to the driver or another group of people. Best advice, act like a moody teenager, people tend to leave them alone, hehe!

Anyway, we travelled to Heathrow Airport from Norwood which is close to Croydon by taking a Night Bus straight to West Croydon Bus Station and switching there to catch one of a few express busses to Heathrow Airport. It cost me nothing more than my normal bus pass I had loaded onto my Oyster Card. Compare that now to taking a taxi to Heathrow which would have cost me around £70 because it was 03:00 in the morning and I stay way on the other side of London. I thought that we would be the only crazy people travelling that time of the morning, boy was I pleasantly surprised to find a lot more people out there.

To be honest, I do not feel any safer by taking a taxi that time of the morning but I suppose some people do. So, here is a thought… explore all the options before you do something, there can be a cheaper, faster and better way to experience London!

Got any questions?

This post will be more about the much deserved praise the NHS deserves than anything else. In case you do not know who or what the NHS is, I’ll tell you again. The NHS stands for National Healthcare Service which is available to all residents in England at no extra charge. It is what they call their Public Healthcare system. The best thing about the NHS is that they offer first class service to all patients without asking for a penny. You will still need to pay for a prescription if you need one but that is a given, medicine can be quite expensive.

Coming from a third-world country, I was gob smacked to find that England’s healthcare system works so brilliantly and better yet, I can get the healthcare I need without having to worry how to pay for it and most people take that for granted. You will never get that type of service and dedication in a third-world country, trust me!

The NHS has it sorted from their website with useful information, to their GP’s to their walk-in centres. Think about this the next time you moan about the NHS. It is just such a shame that people from other countries come in only to make use of their services and to abuse the system but hopefully that will get sorted out in the future. Saying that, I am from a third-world country but I do my part to support the community, not just take, take and take!

So, here is another round of applause to the NHS system, weather you like it or not! If you intend on living in London, then you will be in save hands when it comes to your health.

Wish I had more exciting news and this won’t blow your socks off but London finally have a few air-conditioned busses. I had not realised that the new busses had these little vents until I sat down and felt the nice cool air blowing on me. It could not have come at a more perfect time; it has been a scorcher for the last three days.

 Scorcher, yes, you read right. The weather in London has been fantastic and you can definitely see a lot more people smiling on the street. Summer time is an exciting time in London, so much to see and to do, never mind catching up with friends who live a borough or two away from you.

Anyway, to get back to this amazing new bus I got on yesterday. My initial thought when I got to the top of the double-decker bus that these people have to be crazy to not have any windows open, until I felt the nice cool air blowing on me. I did not even mind sitting in the sunny spot all the way home as I was cooling down. Now I’m going to mind even less sitting in traffic on a hot sunny day, as long as the air-conditioning is working.

Now to get TFL to do something about the conditions on the Underground. It gets unbearably hot down there, not worth taking a tube at all. I did see a few big industrial fans that did nothing but blow hot air around the platform. This is at least something but not enough yet considering how much we fork out on travel in the capital.