Wednesday 1 May 2013

Ride the London Eye

I got to the Eye about 1pm and happily paid an extra £10 (£30) for a fast track ticket and was aboard in fifteen minutes, jumping the hour plus queue.

I had this on the LIFE LIST for a number of reasons:

To challenge my increasing high anxiety.

To get a visual sense of the layout of London, this city I have seen bits and pieces of in movies and TV for years.

Also because its 135 metres tall, second highest Ferris wheel in the world (dam you Singapore!) but the highest cantilever wheel in the world.

It moved slow enough to ease my vertigo cautiously to the heights until almost at the top it stopped......."we apologise for the delay in service we are attending to an incident on the ground, we appreciate your patience". When this came over the intercom the fifteen or so of us on board flashed glances at each other and nervously smiled, I had to laugh out loud.

As someone pointed out at least we were stuck with a view.

After about twenty minutes we started moving again.......backwards! The kid standing next to me and I stared at each other with a look of "oh that's not right?" Then it paused and resumed our normal journey as if nothing had happened.

That all said it was exhilarating and I now have a real sense of how London is laid out and where all the major landmarks are in relation to each other. "Highly" recommended for a brief visit to London.