Tag: Europe

Top 5 Places To Visit In London For Family Travellers

London is one of the favourite cities in the world. It has so many options for tourists to visit, you have no idea where to start! Below are some guide to the top 5 places to visit for family travellers while you’re in London.

1. Piccadilly Circus

As you can see in the picture, Piccadilly Circus is a busy meeting place, and a famous tourist attraction. The place is famous for its video display and neon signs, which are displayed on its buildings.

From this location, you can easily walk to Piccadilly, Leicester Square, Shaftesbury Avenue or Regent Street. Piccadilly circus can be accessed via the Piccadilly and Bakerloo lines.

2. London Paddington

Welcome to the town of the famous Paddington Bear! For the fans of the movie & books, you will love the Paddington Station. There is a bronze statue of Paddington Bear under the clock on Platform 1. Looking for Paddington Bear souvenirs? Head over to the Paddington Bear Shop in the station!

Paddington station is the London terminus for the Heathrow Express train to London Heathrow airport. It also has two separate tube stations providing connections to the Bakerloo, Circle, District, and Hammersmith & City Lines.

3. Coca Cola London Eye

Looking for a great overview scenery of London? Head over to the Coca Cola London Eye! The London Eye is a giant Ferris wheel, on the South Bank of the River Thames in London.

You can buy the ticket on the spot, or you can buy it online, and save 10% off the price. There is also a combination package with other London attractions, so you may want to check their official website: https://www.londoneye.com/tickets-and-prices/

The nearest London Underground station is Waterloo. It is also within walking distance from Charing Cross, Embankment and Westminster.

4. South Bank

South Bank is situated just beside the River Thames. There are usually events and street shows happening in the area, so the walk is very lively! From here, it is walking distance to the iconic landmarks of London, such as Big Ben and Coca Cola London Eye.

5. M&M World London

If you are the type of person who likes cute colourful things, selfie at instagrammable spots and happen to have a sweet tooth, M&M World London will be the perfect place to visit!

Situated in Leicester Square, it is spread across 4 floors, with exclusive M&M’s chocolates and merchandise. If you have a London Pass, show it in-store and enjoy 15% off all purchases made at M&M world London.

These are the top 5 places that are fantastic for family travellers. Enjoy your stay in London!

Top 3 City Destinations That Will Make Your France Road Trip Perfect

France is definitely a great country to visit. Not only because of its beautiful landmarks and sceneries, the people are also very friendly and helpful. However, be ready with some very basic French vocabularies, such as “combien” and “un” to “dix”, as well as “tout droit”. These words will give you such a big help!

For a road trip with very limited time, Below are three top city destinations that you should include in your itinerary.

1. Lille

Perfect for old city lovers, Lille is a historic 17th century city. It offers historical landmarks, museums, heritage sites, shopping, art, great hotels, and restaurants.

You don’t want to miss this city, especially since it is so easy to get to via Eurostar from London (only 90 minutes from London). As for us from Den Haag via Ouibus, it takes a mere 3 hours 55 minutes ride. Both of these will arrive at Gare Lille Europe (signboard in the picture).

The building in the picture is Garre De Lille Flandres, the main Railway Station of Lille. It is a terminus for SNCF Intercity and regional trains. It is only 500m walking distance from Gare Lille Europe, and both stations are adjacent stops on one of the lines of Lille Metro.

2. Rouen

Rouen is a vibrant city with beautiful architecture. The buildings of Rouen shows elements of a Norman architecture, such as half-timbered houses and Gothic cathedrals. Below are some of the buildings worth visiting in Rouen.

The picture is of Le Gros-Horloge (the big clock). It is a beautiful astronomical clock set within a Ressainance arch that stretches over the street bearing the monument’s name.

Other beautiful places and buildings include Historial Jeanne D’Arc, Old Market Square, Grande Pharmacie Du Cntre and the churches.

3. Paris

Visit to France is incomplete without visiting this city of love! Paris has so much to offer it’s visitors. The main one, of course, is the Eiffel Tower. You can choose either to pay more by taking the lift to the first or second floor, or you can pay less and use the stairs! You can skip the long queue by booking online, but be sure to book on a much advanced date, as it is always sold out! Alternatively, you may book your visit with a tour group, which is the fastest way to go up (with a bit more to pay, of course)!

The city is best explored by riding the hop-on-hop-off buss. It will take you to the tourists attractions around Paris. You can then visit Arc De Triomphe and Champs-Elysees, the best shopping place in France!

If you are an art lover, or just want to see the Mona Lisa, head over to the Louvre Museum! The museum is very big, you may want to use the map provided to visit the highlights of the museum, if your time is very limited.

These are the three cities suggested for the city lovers who are having road trip to France. Happy planning and have a great trip!

Europe Trip Day 2 Part 1 – London to Manchester

Our 2nd day of Europe Trip was quite a journey. Both of us are total suckers for public transport, so we decided to have our 2nd day trip by bus. Woohoo!

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Since we planned a lot of transportation & accommodations during our whole Europe Trip, we decided to use technology to organise ourselves. In this case, we used TripIt app.

TripIt is so useful when you have a lot of bookings on hand. Below is the print screen of how our 2nd day trip were planned in TripIt:

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As you can see, on 17 September at 7 a.m., I will be on board National Express NX540 to Manchester Coach Station. Then we will have another journey at 6.15 p.m. to Blackpool Central Coach Station, on board National Express NX333. I have also booked a 4 star TripAdvisor-rated B&B. All this in 1 single page.

If you click further, you will have more details. Below are the examples:

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Well, that’s our sharing for today. Will write again soon!
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Europe Trip Day 1 Part 3 – London

Here goes the 3rd part of our Day 1 trip. We have no idea why the picture uploading didn’t work for the rest of the pictures in the last post. Probably there was a limit? Let’s have a test today.

Ok, let’s continue to the rest of the journey that we had during the rainy day trip (yes, it rained for the rest of the day).

So here goes the rest of our London visit!

1. St James Park

The first picture was that of Shafa & her brother at St James Park. The scenery was beautiful, even in rainy days! This is Shafa’s favourite picture of Day 1, as it potrays perfectly a brother-sister bonding time.

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We are both animal lovers, and so we specifically love this park because of that. Just look at how adorable the ducks and swans at the below picture!

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And of course, one of the reasons why we love London so much is the fact that one attraction is located at a mere walking distance to another. As proven in below picture link.

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2. Trafalgar Square

Some travel books would suggest you to start your journey from Trafalgar Square. While it still depends on where you are based in London, starting you journey from Trafalgar Square may be a good choice. For us, specifically, we’re more than excited to take pictures with the lion statues, being a big fan to the Night at the Museum movie. He he.

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3. The National Gallery

We heard the National Gallery was good, but our time was too packed to explore. So we decided to just take a picture of it.

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4) Night View of the London Eye & Thames River

London at day is spectacular, but night view is even better! Below are the pictures taken at the Embankment, with view of the London Eye & Thames River.

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5) Tower of London & The Shard

Our first day was too packed! We did not have the time (nor the budget) to visit the Tower of London during the day. So we just had a stroll around the Tower of London at night. It was magnificent! And the view of The Shard just made it complete.

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6) Tower Bridge

Last but not least, the Tower Bridge. During the day, the Tower Bridge looks perfect. At night, the lightings made it look even more grand. In this particular picture, the Double Decker bus made it look even more London. 😉

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And so that completes our 1st day journey, Phew! Still long way to catch up.

Till then!

Europe Trip Day 1 Part 2 – London

Hi Everyone!

In our last post, we had shared some of the pictures taken when we had our Emirates Stadium Tour. Before we start to continue sharing pictures of the rest of our Day 1 London tour, let us share a bit on how we booked our stadiums tickets.

Well, as all of you would have known by now, Yusof is a big football fan. Yusof’s favourite is actually Manchester United, but the rest of his family supports Arsenal. So we decided to visit both stadiums.

We initially planned to book the tickets separately at the respective teams’ websites, but then we found this great website called Visit Britain Shop (www.visitbritainshop.com – the site where we also mentioned in our previous post that you can buy your Oyster card).

No price reductions, however (we had searched the internet extensively for a discounted entrance fees to both stadium). Prices were standard, no matter where you buy it. Only thing you gain when you buy at Visit Britain Shop is the convenience of buying them at one place! Not to mention you can also search for other places entrance tickets (together with promotional prices, if available). We would highly suggest this website if you do plan to buy any entrance tickets in the UK.

Enough said on this, let us now share with you the pictures of the rest of our Day 1 trip!

big ben

Us, in front of the House of Parliament, its clock tower is also famously known as Big Ben. It was raining and traffic jam, so ignore the background 😛

London Eye

Shafa in front of the London Eye. Also still raining, but Shafa didn’t mind being drenched.

Buckingham Palace

Yusof, Shafa & Bang Shah (Shafa’s brother), getting all happy wefie-ing in front of the Buckhingham Palace. With the hope of bumping into any of the royalties, but no luck.

Well, we do plan to upload more pictures in this post, but something went wrong. They couldn’t be uploaded! We will continue again in the next post. Till then!

Europe Trip Day 1 Part 1 – Emirates Stadium (Arsenal)

It’s been a month since we arrived London, and we just want to start writing about our 1st day there. Sigh, we were too busy with work when we got back, but we vow to not let that be in our way!

Our 1st visit on September 15, 2015 was to the Arsenal stadium. It was drizzling that day, but we were too excited to be down about it!

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That’s Yusof with Shafa’s brother proudly standing in front of the stadium (with umbrellas :p)

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Yusof landing his hand to save Thierry Henry from being drenched.

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Yusof getting his photography inspiration. Football is his passion! 🙂

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“One day, I’ll be one of them” probably the voice in Yusof’s mind? :p

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Shafa enjoying her visit. She had no idea who were those guys, she only chose based on looks :p

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Yusof’s favourite player in Arsenal. 🙂

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Shafa’s getting all energetic!

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Somebody’s having press conference :p

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“Let’s go and play at the field! Who cares about the rain”.

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The MOST epic picture. Arsenal’s future manager. He he.

All in all, it was a great Arsenal stadium self tour with audio guide. Worth the £20 paid. 🙂

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London Journey Plan

And so our Europe travel began in London. We took the tube (Piccadilly line) to Shafa’s brother’s house in Wood Green. The area was reachable by Piccadilly line, so no train change needed!

Of course, we use Oyster card in our London travels to enjoy cheaper rate & price caps (refer TFL website for details). The card can be bought from the airport train station. Just ask anyone, they’ll guide you.

Alternatively, you can buy it online (we prefer to shop for UK tickets at http://www.visitbritainshop.com – it’s a one stop centre). You can key in your departure date, they’ll make sure to deliver the card to you on time. Only downside, you’ll have delivery charges (in British Pound). You can gauge & decide whether you want to be worry free and have the card before your journey or just buy it at Heathrow airport. We’re sure Malaysians will do the latter, considering our currency against GBP. 🙂

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In any case that your destination is using another line, be sure to check out the London tube map. You can view the map at TFL website, also they will have a journey planner at their website.

Alternatively, you can download an app called London Journey Planner. But personally, our favourite app is called FetchMyWay (for Android) & Rome2Rio (for iOS). It will literally gets you from anywhere to anywhere (it doesn’t necessarily have to be station names), with details on costs & timing. Also there are options of different transportation alternatives (including walking!). Below are some screenshots of the app:

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That’s all for our tips on London journey plan. See you in next entry!

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To London with Love

Hey there!

We’ve been so busy with our travels, that we just had time to update our blog. It will be quite a work to remember our journey for the past 1 week, but we’ll try!

We had our Kuala Lumpur – London flight on Tuesday, 15th September 2015 at 11.05 pm. It was a long day for Shafa at work and a slow day for Yusof at work, so we both were excited by the time we reached the airport!

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We boarded British Airways. The flight was on time and the journey was smooth, though there were some bumpy rides along the way.

Service was good on board the plane. There was a halal menu selection for Muslims! 🙂 However, we (Shafa specifically) were quite disappointed that BA did not provide any pillow neck. Only the small, quite hard, pillow was provided. Movies on board were average.

This was Yusof’s first long distance flight, so Shafa gave some good advice on how to avoid jet lag, i.e. sleep following destination time. Turns out Shafa sleeps first before Yusof, and before the planned time! :p

We arrived London Heathrow as per planned, at about 5.25 am. Total 13 hours 20 minutes journey.

If you are a Malaysian, you will need to fill in the landing card to enter the UK. Words of advise to have a smooth process:
1) Fill in the landing card in full the moment you receive them in airplane
2) Have the details of your trip ready, especially your UK accommodation details, and the details of the person you plan to stay with in the UK (if any)
3) Be as ‘kiasu’ as possible to go out of the plane when landed. The que can get super long (as per below picture):

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Once you’re done with the UK Border, pick up your luggage and buy an Oyster card for your London travels. Really help to save on your journeys!

Public transportation is comprehensive in London. Just need some time to familiarise, and voila, you will be hoping that your country have the same transportation system!

That’s all for now. Will continue to write about our trip in the next entry. Bye!

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