I don’t know how the record of my recent visit to london will work out but I will try and give you the essence of what I have learned as well as useful prompts for my own memory to assist in recalling the details.

My policy is to leave in very good time allowing for contingencies so we left home at 9:45 a.m. in preparation for the Megabus that left Bristol at 12:30. A local bus that we have come to rely on is the 172 that goes from Bath to Bristol via Radstock. We arrived at Bristol bus station at 11:30 a.m. and visited a local cafe to have a breakfast. It is a community cafe which is adjacent to a homeless shelter and the staff are not always trained but the atmosphere is good and I will always support them.

Megabus seem to have a lot of foreign drivers, we had a Greek driver and a Spanish assistant and they looked at our documents casually and had no list that we could see. Everything is done via mobile phone these days so I suppose if you have your records then that’s all that is needed.

The pricing model is different to National Express. The latter whack up their prices a huge amount in the holiday season but Megabus tend to keep to a level playing field so two return journeys to London cost about 46 pounds. The journey took two hours 45 minutes with one stop at Heathrow where most people got out.

We then waked to London Victoria train station. We had signed up for the 2 for 1 travel card which means that when two people are traveling together they get a third off of the price. This can be used on any journey long or short, single or return. We saved about three pounds going from Victoria to Croydon.

I measure the value of a journey or an event by the quality of the contacts that I make. On the train I saw a colored lady who had an extraordinary handbag with text on the front saying ‘ God says I am.….. and then mentioned various qualities such as beautiful, original, loved, brave

It was so nice to meet someone who is unapologetic about their faith and I immediately talked to her about the importance of giving testimony. I later returned to her, she was standing by the door, and made some other comment and she smiled at me. I was filled with the most wonderful feeling of peace from top to bottom and I felt I had really been blessed. We said nothing more and we left the train appropriately.

That augers well for my trip, I thought.

We spent a pleasant evening just ‘landing’  in London and exchanging family matters with my sister.

We did not sleep a particularly well that night indeed for the whole trip. The bedding was either too warm or too cold or kept coming off but it just takes time I suppose.