Ep. 332 - Bonus - Mind the Gap: Experiencing London and Barcelona Pre- and Post-Cruise

00:00.00 dclduo Welcome back everybody this week's bonus episode of the dcl duo podcast brought to you by my path unwinding travel and we got a little preview I think of a show that's going to be coming up later this week because we've got our friends Drew and Haley joining us who our show later this week. They'll be. Talking all about their Mediterranean Cruise with us. But that cruise was so extra large so super size that ah we had to have them on to talk about what they did before and after the cruise because Drew and Haley got up to some fun in both Barcelona and London and so we wanted to hear from them about that. So. Me start by welcoming Drew and Haley to the show. Welcome guys. 00:40.35 Hayley Thank you, It's great to be here. 00:42.45 Drew Um, hello. Thank you. 00:43.55 dclduo So you started pre cruise in Barcelona and I remember there's a little history here as to why you did that because I think you were going to fly to London and do a cruise on a different cruise line and. 00:52.90 Sam Um, yes. 00:58.74 dclduo Then you found out that flights were cheaper over to Barcelona which blows my mind but I think you ended up in baring lona it's for some flight reasons is that right. 01:03.53 Hayley And actually the reverse of that. Yeah, so actually we were scheduled to go on the on the um odyssey of the seas on roqueobean out of Barcelona. 01:10.61 Drew Symphony here. 01:14.15 Hayley But flights are cheaper through London um, if you are coming on Charlotte there's a nice direct flight from Charlotte to London and then you can do like a British Airways flight from London to Barcelona. So. 01:18.91 Sam Um, nice. 01:24.30 Hayley That's how we ended up in London at the end of our cruise. Um, but we did fly into Barcelona and I have been to Barcelona before I studied abroad in Spain in college in seviia. So I had been to Barcelona for the weekend before um, but Drew had not been to Spain at all. So it' his first time. Um, although some. 01:38.48 Drew Um, nope. 01:43.13 Hayley The cat the catalans will say Barcelona is not Spain Barcelona is Barcelona and Catalonia is its own place about a day and a half by the time we got there. 01:44.81 Sam Is Ray Barcelona 01:47.90 dclduo And so so how much time did you have pre cruise in Barcelona. Ok all right all right? So I mean Barcelona in a day and a half is kind of like trying to see New York city in a day and a half I feel like so you're gonna hit the highlights you're gonna hit the highlights. 02:01.12 Hayley You you know you can get a lot down though I mean we we went through la ramb bla um on Saturday morning before we got on the ship we went to the Picasso Museum we did the Sagrada Familia we did the palace of catalan music which is incredible. 02:17.34 Drew Parkway. 02:18.89 Hayley We did park gu we saw the outside of the different Gaudi houses. Um and went into the gift shop of 1 of them. So I think you you can really get a great experience in Barcelo and in and see ah pretty much all the main things I would say in like three days so we really didn't get. 02:34.51 Drew Um, yeah. 02:37.96 Hayley Like too too much of a discounted if you will experience in the time we were there. 02:41.14 Drew The good thing about all these major european cities is once you get to them most of it is walkable or they have great public transportation systems that you use to get around and see things and so the hardest part for us is americans is getting over there to Europe. 02:50.61 Sam A. 03:00.80 Drew But once you can get into these cities. It's very easy to get around and see a lot of stuff in a short amount of time. 03:06.30 Sam Um, yeah. 03:07.40 Hayley Yeah, it's true. 03:07.64 dclduo How did you figure out what to do in barcela you and you mentioned on the show. We just recorded with you about your your med cruise that your big ricks to use fans is that where you found most of your information on what to do in barcelin or or Haley do you rely on a you know your prior experience there. 03:23.89 Hayley A little of both but we we definitely did buy the Rick Steves barcelona book um you know if it ain't broke. Don't fix it so we we did that and you know he's got like really detailed itineraries like you know, spend this amount of time here because I'm the kind of person who reads like every plaque in the museum. So I need the guardrails to tell me like you really should only spend 2 hours at this place like or you will be dragging me away and I'm like but I haven't read all the things. So um, you know that's really helpful and Rick Steves for example is how we found out that the Picasso museum is free on Thursdays Thursday nights. 03:43.82 Sam Is. 03:48.90 Drew E. 03:56.93 Sam Oh cool. 04:00.46 Hayley So we got free tickets to the to the Picasso museum and we got we did pay like an extra ten Euros for the audio guide which was nice just because I find that I go faster through the museum if I have the audio guide instead of just like being left my own devices to read everything. So. 04:16.73 Drew Um, yeah, so only look at the things the audio guide tells her thinking about everything. 04:16.91 Sam Really? ah it limits it make but but maybe not at the Harry Potter um studio tour. So. 04:20.81 Hayley Yes, exactly um I think my takework oh question I oh yeah, we'll we'll get to that. But um I think my my big takeaway from the the Picasso museum was just like how talented he was from an early age. There's a self. 04:28.72 Drew Um, no, we ran out of time. Well yeah, we'll touch on that later. But yeah. 04:37.50 Sam E. 04:40.10 Hayley For sure that he did at 15 that is just like insane and it also crazy. 04:43.70 Drew It's it's ah it's a masterwork in itself and it's like not even something you see mentioned or associated with him and it's incredible and there's this one whole room where he liked this 1 painting so much that he did it like. 04:48.65 Hayley Ever. 04:57.70 Drew 450 times or something he created variations of this 1 painting. That's like what you just? yeah. 04:59.98 Hayley I and it's a painting by somebody else. It's a painting by Edie Vlaquez and he just was like I'm going a riff on this I'm going to spend four months riffing on this and he just did it over and over and he had a command of so many different styles of art and you hear about the cubism because that's what he like. 05:07.82 Sam Wow. 05:09.73 Drew Um, yeah. 05:18.90 Hayley Kind of pioneered and is famous for but he's really incredibly talented in so many different forms of painting and drawing and I just had no idea until we went to the museum so that was really really cool. 05:28.10 Drew Yeah, definitely gave us a much deeper appreciation for him and his work. 05:31.99 Hayley Yeah, so that was the only thing we did on our arrival day because we didn't get into Barcelona until like 32 or something so we went and had some lunch and had some payea for lunch and then we went to the museum after we gotten checked into our hotel and then we had dinner after and then. 05:44.14 Drew Um, check there into the hotel. Yeah. 05:51.12 Hayley In Barcelona and in Spain in general like lunchtime is like one o'clock is like old person early lunch. So it's really like 1 to three pm is lunchtime and then dinner time old person early is like nine Zero p m so it's really a difficult transition if you're an american. Coming from our time zone and we eat like at six P M at home. So that was an adjustment for the stomach you know in eating at those hours of the day. Um, so that that that's something to be aware of if you're going to Spain for the first time and you don't know that. Um, and then the next day we woke up and we went to the palace of catalan music and I'll let drew talk about that because I feel like I've been talking a lot. 06:32.65 Drew Yeah, it's honestly I think a hidden gym like I I had never heard of it before we went I think we found it through Rick Steves it was one of his things that he recommended. 06:42.65 Hayley Yes, yep. 06:44.67 Drew And we went and it's incredible. It's like this music hall that the people built there is this choir back in the either late eighteen hundreds early nineteen hundreds and they wanted to ah this choir gained a lot of like fame and popularity there in the town of Barcelona and so the people. 07:02.24 Sam Um. 07:03.35 Drew Gave all this money to build this um palace of catalan music and so it's absolutely incredible inside. They have this skylight that is beautiful. Um, and if if you're standing below it and looking up it looks flat. And it just looks like a big giant stained glass skylight. But if you get up on the second level and are looking at it. It's actually 3 dimensional and it's like coming into the room and it looks really cool and the whole thing is in the style of like Gaudi. Um. 07:32.87 Sam Oh cool. 07:34.38 Hayley Why it's so cool that. 07:41.24 Hayley It wasn't gadi who did it. It was a different architect but it's the the catalogalant letter needs name the art nouva style. Um, and we'll have to give you eyes some pictures of that too. But it was it was stunning and like Drew said a hidden gym. We did an english tour of it. 07:42.16 Drew That art a new vote. Yes, yeah. 07:46.77 Sam That's the art. Yeah. 07:59.28 Hayley Um, which I recommend the tour because you can get closer to the stage and if you go just on your own. 08:00.83 Sam Is it. 08:03.49 Drew Yeah, yeah, there are certain areas we could only get into because we took the stage through the ah the palace of catalog music and it wasn't very expensive I want to say like 10 or fifteen euros and there was only like 5 or 6 of us on the tour and so. 08:13.43 Hayley Yeah, yeah. 08:18.47 Drew It was really nice. A great experience and you got to go right up to the stage and they've got beautiful tile work and statues and mosaics and it was just great and I would highly recommend it if you got a little current. Yes. 08:28.85 Hayley And you can actually go see performances there a working concert venue. So that's your other option you will. 08:34.47 Sam Oh cool. 08:37.90 Drew They have like a modern hall right next to it. That's basically named the same thing. So the tour guide told us she was like if you want to come see a show here. Make sure you book the right one not the like super modern hall that's ah in the building next to it. But this one. 08:46.70 Sam Yeah. 08:46.62 dclduo Yeah. 08:48.59 Hayley Yeah, yeah, there's like like the Salah princey Paul or something I can't remember what they call it. But there's one of them is like the main venue and then they have like I think it's in the basement actually like a smaller more intimate more modern venue that is cool. 08:51.54 Sam Right? right. 08:55.38 Drew Um, yeah. 09:03.53 Drew Um, yeah. 09:07.38 Hayley For what it is but it's not what you're trying to to see yeah and root Steve said that the palace of Catalan Music has the best modern east may interior in Barcelona and I I don't know I can top it after we saw it. 09:08.32 Sam Right? It's all you're just going to like a regular concert venue in the states or something. Yeah. 09:13.00 Drew Um, right. 09:20.50 Sam Yeah, cool. 09:22.34 Drew Not believe it. It was yeah and yeah, so from there we ah went and we did a little walking tour to see a lot of the doudy and other art nouveau style houses along the street. 09:25.99 Hayley Was awesome. 09:39.34 Drew Um, so that was neat. We got to walk down. 09:39.49 Hayley Um, this was like a Rick Steves walking tour like we just I just was pulling out the guidebook and reading about it to drew narrating so free i. 09:43.94 Sam Oh cool. Well I mean it it wasn't free. It cost you what the fifteen or twenty dollars for that guide that book. Yeah. 09:47.19 Drew Um, yeah, we did that. 09:51.73 Hayley By the book. Yeah yeah. 09:52.52 Drew Yeah, but then then we did that to basically kill time before we got to go into this sagrata familia. So they let you in. 10:01.48 Sam Oh yeah. 10:02.69 Hayley And the sagraticmelia I had been before Drew had not but I was like if we do 1 thing in Barcelona we're doing this and not only because it's like the thing that you do but because it truly is incredible like the stained glass in there I'm obsessed with it. We bought a window cling that is. 10:02.91 dclduo Nice. 10:08.28 Sam You have to? yeah. 10:20.81 Hayley 1 of the stained glass windows from the sagrata famelia because and it's like above our kitchen sink now because I love it so much. Yes, that's true. There's like whole towers that didn't exist when I was there in 2011 10:24.75 Sam So fun. 10:27.14 Drew Um, and it's it's still under construction so they had completed things that were not complete the last time she was there just a years ago 10:38.60 dclduo Yeah, isn't the isn't the thing with the sagrata Familia That's like it's never going to be finished. 10:39.39 Hayley Um, and they're supposed to be well, it's supposed to be finished in 2026 for the centennial of the death of Antony Gaudi but covid I think has set them back a bit so I'm not sure if they're still going to make the timeline or not. 10:41.40 Sam That it's never finished. 10:53.14 Drew Um, yeah, yeah, that's what our guard told us. 10:53.54 dclduo Yeah. 10:56.30 Hayley But we did um, get to go up in one of the elevators and to in one of the the towers we went up in the Nativity tower. So we got to see that and we did an English to ah a guided tour in English of the sagata familia. So there's an audio guy that you can do if you don't do the guided tour but you definitely want to have someone telling you about it because. 11:12.23 Sam Are. 11:14.60 Hayley Think you appreciate it more when you can like compare the nativity facade where it's just like much more ornately decorated to the passion facade which is like the story of the crucifixion of Christ and like the architecture on that side is more sparse because they want it to make you think of bones and death. 11:30.47 Sam Oh wow. 11:33.16 Hayley Um, which is really cool and then inside the stained glass on the Eastern side of the building is more warm colors because that's where the sun rises um and then on the other side. It's more blues and greens where the sun sets so like nighttime as night is falling. It's more cool colors. So. 11:44.17 Drew And that's and that's also the side that faces the ocean rather than the mountains. The mountains are on the side that where the sun rises and the oceans on the other side of the sea. 11:52.62 Hayley Oh yeah, yeah, that's true. So it's there's a lot of cool stuff like that that you wouldn't necessarily just know if you by going in on your own without any kind of guidance. The Rick Seeavs also has a tour of the saga familia in his book. Um. 11:55.86 Sam So. 12:10.10 Hayley I promise that we are not affiliate partners of Rick Steves we do not get paid things I know he might want to pay us for the 4 times we're we're on your podcast talking about this stuff. 12:12.73 Sam But he might want to sponsor you he might want to you know he? yeah right? he might he might want to help subsidize your trip your next trip to Europe and. 12:14.60 Drew Um, many people should be. 12:20.34 dclduo Yeah. 12:25.50 Hayley And ah, only if only but yeah so saraa Familia just you got to do it. It's amazing and it's ah the the stained glass in there too is really different than a lot of other churches in Europe because it's not actually telling stories from the bible. It's more like. 12:25.50 Drew Are. 12:41.76 Sam Right. 12:44.69 Hayley Just colors and colors and shapes and so it's it's different than a lot of the upwoods that you see. 12:48.10 Drew And and it was done in like the nineteen hundreds instead of like the fourteen hundreds and things like that. So it's got a little bit more of a modern feel to it and think. 12:53.79 Sam Right. 12:55.80 Hayley And yeah, yeah, it's just it's different and it's really really cool. Um, and like I said I'm a little just a little obsessed with it I may or may not have also bought earrings with the stainglas and and a bookmark. So. 13:09.94 Sam Love it. 13:12.83 Hayley Um, you can tell them where we went from there. Yeah. 13:14.73 Drew Yeah, and from there we went to park gua which is ah a park. It was actually intended to be like a planned community for like rich people and gaudi was going to build all these houses and things in this park for like a lot of rich people. And they ended up only building I think 2 or 3 houses and the the plan kind of or the project just kind of fell apart and I think he started other things like the sagrada familia and things like that and so the plan never came to fruition but you do have these this now. It's a nice beautiful park with these like 2 or 3 gaudi. Inspired houses one of which is the 1 he lived in for most of his life. Um, and so it was really cool to go there and see the architecture and there's this real nice like kind of open plaza where you can walk around and there's benches in his art style all around that you can sit at. And at the far end the plaza kind of looks over the city of Barcelona and so it's a very nice viewpoint that you can go up and take pictures at and things like that. So. 14:16.54 dclduo Very cool. Well I know at the tail end of the cruise you all visited 1 of our favorite cities to visit London and actually got up to some of our favorite things to do in London. 14:16.89 Sam Awesome. 14:29.32 dclduo Um, but I noticed that ah 1 thing I wanted to ask about in the beginning is you all stayed in I think you called it a pod hotel can you can you talk about that a little bit. 14:29.36 Drew Um, is this. 14:37.76 Hayley Yeah I Oh we stayed at a place called ah it was like originally called Hotel reading Chroma I think now it's called cozy and chic red hotel reading or something I think they rebranded. 14:38.20 Sam Oh we I wouldn't know where they stayed in Barcelona though we never asked. 14:55.72 Hayley Um, it was one of the ones that Rick Steves recommended but it's a very quick walk to laramla which is like 1 of the main tourist strips with stuff to look at um, we went to one of the markets off of la rammla on Saturday morning before the cruise and we didn't talk about that but Drew had a really delicious fruit juice that he. 15:12.29 Drew Yeah, that they were squeezing fresh there. But yeah, so we stayed a couple blocks from La Romb bla in that nice place. But so this pod hotel Um I was a little bit nervous going into it as we've covered on other things I'm not a small man. 15:13.39 Hayley Is very excited about that. 15:18.73 Hayley Sure Yeah, it was a good location. 15:31.32 Drew Um, and so I was a little nervous when you hear pod hotel and and you're a big guy. You're like oh don't know about this. 15:36.23 Hayley Yeah, because like the the basic room there is just like very very small like the idea is like it's feet. Yeah. 15:41.44 Drew I Think yeah like it's basically a closet with a double bed in it and a shower you know, but we got we got the bigger room which I think I'm almost certain that our cabin on the Disney ship was bigger than our hotel room there and that. 16:00.74 Hayley You can In fact, walk all the way around the bed in the big room. 16:00.92 Drew Ah, bigger room. Yes, that one That's what institute can still makes a bigger room the other one. The bed is just against the wall and you have to just lay on it this and walk around got like a foot on each side. 16:08.95 Sam Right? Get to climb across it. Yeah yeah, I've stayed in a hotel in New York that was like that where you could barely you could like just barely get around the bed. 16:18.51 Drew Um. 16:26.19 Drew Um, yeah, yeah. 16:27.41 Sam Um, and that was it. It was big enough for the bed and then it had like a tiny little bathroom. Yeah. 16:30.53 Hayley So and the idea of of reading these is good. 16:32.58 Drew It served our purpose. It served our purpose but it's definitely not a Saint erines. Ah. 16:37.10 Hayley You know it was at the same tubetop as st erine's and let me tell you we spent less than £500 total for 3 nights and we were at the same loss. Yes. 16:45.60 Sam Wow yeah, so you were at a great location for a really good budget price for London I mean London is an expensive city what they're talking about for those who are listening the the st armmonds hotel is the hotel that we. 16:46.17 dclduo Oh wow. 16:48.15 Drew Um. 16:54.39 Drew Um, yeah. 17:03.37 Sam And Drew and Haley and Haley's parents stayed at um before and after our cruise um actually not after for you guys but before and after our crewise um out of dover and you know the Norway the Norway Cruise and it's a beautiful hotel. It's in a great neighborhood. And so but it is a pricey hotel. It's affiliated with the Marriott um property use. 17:27.60 Hayley It's yeah, ah we we were sad. We weren't staying in st erine's but it was literally like eight hundred pounds a night so it was not going to be that was a nonstarter when we could you know, save the money to do other things. So. 17:33.12 Sam Yeah. 17:34.35 dclduo Um, yeah. 17:41.83 Drew We found out we were having a big bike race in something called ah hub London while we were there which is basically that was the Saturday that we were there but ah or was it. Yeah, the Saturday we were there. 17:44.59 Sam Is. 17:54.21 Hayley And the sunday. 17:54.71 Drew They shut down a bunch of the streets in London and you can just ride your bikes and walk all over the place which was incredible for us because we could just walk and go wherever we wanted didn't have to worry about traffic and things. 18:07.52 Hayley Which is really nice in London because you're always worried. You're looking the wrong way when you're like trying to figure out where the cars are coming from. You know they've got the pavement labeled so that you know what direction to look because they know so many people are coming from countries that drive on the right and not the left. Um. 18:08.86 Sam It's awesome. Yeah. 18:19.35 Drew Um, says. 18:20.60 Sam Right? Because everyone from Mainland Europe drives on the right like we do? yeah. 18:23.23 Drew Um, yeah. 18:25.00 Hayley Yeah, like we do like pretty much every other place in in the world As far as I know Um, but yeah, but. 18:30.49 Sam Yeah, except Australia New Zealand and then there's some other former british colonies in like Africa that also drive on the left. Yeah yep. 18:31.17 Drew Um, Australia maybe birth. 18:38.95 Hayley It' see the british ruining everything um their colonization but no, um, but the the hub hotel so it's it's hub by premiere in um so preiere in is like a chain hotel brand in the united kingdom and they've only got the hub. Um. Like these little pod hotels the hub hotels in London and like a couple in Edinburgh and that's it but they do have um, there's one in I think Covent Garden is one of the other ones and that was we wanted to stay in that one because it was like right in the heart of the theater district. But. 19:02.44 Sam If. 19:14.79 Hayley It was already full so we were like oh but this other one's like right? where St Ermans is so that'll work fine. We know that's a good, a good location. Very convenient to things. Um, we had to make our own bed. We could not figure out the fitted sheet so we ended up sleeping in it more like a little weird sleeping bag situation. Um, so you know there's so. 19:20.99 Drew You know a 10 bro naked. 19:32.53 Hayley And Quarks to it and the other quirk to it is that there's like a control panel like a touchscreen control panel that governs like the lights and the air conditioning and everything and if you want the light on it has to be on in the bathroom part and the bedroom part at the same time like there's not way to. 19:44.96 Sam Oh that's annoying. 19:45.13 Drew Yeah, like there's only like 3 settings for the lights so you just got to pick one of those settings and whatever lights are on or on. Yeah. 19:50.20 Hayley Yeah, so there's like a low light sweating which basically just provides under counter lighting in the bathroom and that's it. So like if you wanted to leave that all but it's like a nightlight kind of deal you could. And yeah, exactly you're not. 19:58.11 Sam Oh or if you need to turn something on to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night so you don't you know, fall off a curb. 20:03.54 Drew Are yes. 20:09.38 Hayley Right? Exactly you're not like flooding the entire room with light. Um, but you know it was. It was very close quarters. They they made an efficient use of space. They've got like a little desk area that you could work out if you needed to there is a chair in there. There's like a little wardrobe area with hangars. So like they. Got a pretty efficient use of space kind of like a cruise ship. You can put your luggage under the bed but you know it's not It's not the laugh of luxury. But if anyone listening to this is you know, looking for a budget friendly option I think it's a good one. It They've got a breakfast that you can do a continental breakfast for like £5 something like that. Yeah yes. 20:44.36 Sam No Wow Listen this sounds like a great alternative to like a hostel right? Like if you want a private space you like the thing I don't like about hostels is the lack of privacy right? And so if you want a private space but you want something that's budget friendly. Sounds like this is. 20:52.28 Drew Um, yes. 20:56.19 Drew Um, yeah. 20:56.33 Hayley Sir. 21:02.33 Drew Um, yeah, if that's exactly what this is um. 21:04.38 Sam Ah, very good option. 21:04.44 Hayley Yeah, this is definitely the way to go. It's It's like a hostile but grown-up for Grown-ups who need some space from other people and don't want to make friends with random travelers. Um, so yeah, that was that was good actually. Um. 21:08.46 Sam Yeah. 21:19.48 Sam Well let's let's talk about the goings on in London or what you got up to in London so you you get off the ship you're are you ported in ah your port in Barcelona and you're flying. Um, right? You're not this doesn't this ship didn't port in in Dover like. 21:28.96 Hayley Yes, yes, no. 21:35.16 Sam We did. 21:35.39 Drew Ah, we got off and immediately got in a taxi went straight to the airport went through securityity. Yeah because we wanted to do walk off and have the first get off early because we had second dinner our time. 21:38.87 Hayley We did Kabbaanas on departure morning we did cabbaanas instead of our like dedicated breakfast at hope summer. 21:52.33 Drew Dining time was later so we got off we got on the plane we flew to London and that night we went by the time we got there. It was time to check in for our hotel so we went straight to our hotel. We got checked in dropped off our luggage and then we went to. 22:08.42 Hayley I went to dinner. Yeah, we went to dinner I I just looked on. Um I think yelp or something I think I was looking for restaurants near the globe theater because we went to the globe theater for a show that night and I found this. 22:11.70 Drew Dinner some meat. 22:23.16 Hayley Pasta restaurant that dad did handmade pasta and you could join the queue virtually so that was nice and so we went to that and had some delicious pasta some barata and it was great and then we went to a. See the comedy of errors at the globe theater which was cool. We. We saw the tempest at the globe when we we went on our norway cruise extravaganza in September Twenty Twenty two so this was not our first time seeing a show at the globe. It was my first time seeing a comedy of errors so that was. 22:59.30 Drew Yeah I definitely think if you like theater or Shakespeare. You've got to see a show at the globe. It's just you know a rite of passage. We haven't been there when Macbeth or something else is playing but I honestly would probably prefer to see the comedies anyway, they're more entertaining and and you don't have to be able to comprehend. 22:59.44 Hayley Was a fun experience. 23:12.43 Sam Yeah. 23:18.40 Drew Every word of old English to understand the plot when it's comedy. Yeah. 23:19.54 dclduo I. 23:20.14 Sam Yeah, never. 23:22.65 Hayley Um, it's It's mostly a lot of sex jokes and the things in the kind try I was my other major was English My two Majors English and Spanish So you learn how to identify Elizabethsian sex jokes and it's just a skill. That's no purpose than in any other context. But no, that was fun and by that time we were like okay, it's time for bed so we went went back and went to sleep. Um and the next day we woke up and we went to just grab some breakfast somewhere. Trumpets which is near St The St Erines was not open Unfortunately so we did not get to gain any crumpets on this trail. Yeah um I I know I will I will was us have had those too I have to look out for them. 23:56.99 Sam Oh bummer, you have to stick to your your um trader Joe's crumpets then I guess at home. But. 24:02.59 Drew Um, yeah, yeah, we ended up just stopping it like a Pret or something like a Pret. 24:08.50 Hayley Something something quick but we we went to the national gallery because we didn't hit that up last time when we were in London and Drew had not been and I love going to art museums with Drew because he was in like the national art honor society in high school and he really appreciates art and I love just like listening to him tell me what he likes about different paintings. It's just really fun. 24:24.94 Sam Oh. 24:28.29 Hayley Um, so I wanted him to see like the van gogh sunflowers and there's lots of Monet in the national gallery and all that so we went and did that for maybe like an hour or so um and then we had a Sunday roast for lunch at a place called Sophie Soho which 24:31.80 Sam Oh yeah, that's it. 24:33.20 Drew Um, yeah I Really yeah. 24:42.94 Drew Um, yeah, it is. 24:44.99 Sam Gum. 24:45.68 Hayley At last time but it's like great place to get your traditional you know beef Rump roast Sunday roset with the yorkshire pudding and the roasted vegetables including the parsnips. Um, so yeah, leave. 24:53.66 Drew Um, if. 24:57.48 dclduo I'll put in a plug for 2 other spots that we love to get Sunday roast dinner at so if you're headed over to London ah 2 spots. We love. Ah 1 is when we've been to several times which is the mayflower pub which is really far off the beaten path just to prepare folks. You have to take the. Tube over to an overland train into kind of a you know, just like a little suburban neighborhood and they've got a bar right on the thames called the the mayflower pub. It's supposedly the site that the mayflower departed from but they have a fabulous Sunday roast dinner that we've enjoyed they have a fabulous. Sort of dinner there upstairs and it's a traditional pub downstairs with some outdoor seating and closed outdoor seating because it's London. They also do pub trivia there Drew and Healy. So yeah, so another another spot to add to your list. It's a lot of fun. Ah, the second spot is when we discovered this last trip. Ah, we were looking for a Sunday roast dinner. 25:40.88 Hayley Um, really. 25:50.57 dclduo After getting back into London because we realized we had enough time to get dinner the evening we got back and we found a spot called the harwood arms again a little off the beaten path but it turned out to be. It was like a Michelin starred restaurant wasn't it Sam that was yeah. 26:04.36 Sam It's like a yeah, it was like a gastro pub that did its own version of like a roast dinner so is a little more upscale and quite delicious I mean both are both are fantastic options. Um. 26:04.90 Drew Um, and the house. 26:12.32 dclduo It was amazing. 26:18.93 Sam Yeah, it's just a matter of if you want to if you're open to a little bit of ah a higher end twist on the Sunday roast type dinner which was I thought it was great. Yeah. 26:26.98 dclduo Yeah, yeah, more. 26:27.20 Hayley There you go yeah Sophie Soho is conveniently located in the middle of of everything. So if you have to go to 1 of Brian and Sam Suggestions that's awesome on. No yeah. 26:34.62 Sam Yeah, yeah, plus it's you can do a lunch I mean a lot of the places don't do lunch as the full roast the full roast meal as lunch a lot of them Only do it as dinner. 26:46.98 Hayley Yeah, you get the whole thing which is helpful and they like they've got this gigantic like grill that they're were doing the meats on in the restaurant. So um, it's really good. We we went there on our last trip to and I knew it was ah really like a 10 minute walk from the national gallery. So super convenient. Um to do that. 26:54.79 Sam Yam yeah. 27:06.21 Drew Yes, yes, this was the thing that I was really looking forward to I am a huge soccer football. Whatever you want to call it fan I've grown up playing it I loved it my whole life. 27:06.79 Hayley Um, and then I'm going to let drew talk about what else we did on Sunday because this was really for him. 27:25.30 Drew And so I've always wanted to see a game in England in Europe see the premier league. That's always been a dream and and I'm personally an arsenal supporter. Um, because when you're a little kid. What do you pick your favorite team by that team's got a canon. That's a great reason to pick a great league team. You know. 27:41.96 dclduo No, ah. 27:44.82 Drew Ah, so I've cheered for them since I was little um and so we the the richmond. Yes, um so but we actually got the opportunity on Sunday afternoon it was. 27:47.46 Sam I I cheer for the greyhounds I Just want to put that out there. The rich and greyhounds exactly. 27:52.43 Hayley Um, well who doesn't and we all love free and ask the richmond forever. 28:03.26 Drew The final day of the league season. So everything team plays together at the same time all around the country and we are season ticket members to Charlotte Fc and Mls team here in the us Charlotte fc has broken attendance records. 28:05.52 Sam Um, ah so fun. 28:21.80 Drew Does amazing things. We've done a really good job. It still is like nothing compared to in Europe in their stadiums. Everyone's chanting. Everyone's singing. It's just like in a completely different atmosphere getting to go to this stadium. And see this game and we won 5 to nothing which made it even better. So it was It's definitely was one of the highlights of the entire trip for me probably 1 of the highlights of like my life or you know the last year because it was just. 28:43.70 Sam No. 28:57.41 Drew Such an incredible experience something I've dreamed about doing for so long and to actually get to be there and see them when and it was just unbelievable I couldn't even like do a lot of the cheers and things because I was like overwhelmed with emotion being there and seeing it and things. 29:10.50 Sam Oh now did you also get to buy like a a jersey while you were there I mean you probably had a Jersey but I feel like you they have probably more variety there. 29:13.34 Hayley Yeah I think. 29:18.84 Drew Yes, I already get and bought a new one. So it really still next year's jerseys like the week we were on the cruise and so I went there and bought the brand New Jersey and got Haley one as well. So. 29:24.16 Hayley That. 29:33.75 Sam Of course. 29:35.75 Hayley Yeah, we we did. We did do that and um, yeah, it was. It was really really cool. Um, we it was because it was the last game of the season like the team came out and like spoke afterward and like they walked around to all four sides of the stadium so that everybody could cheer for them. You know the captain had things to say so it was really really cool. We were crammed in like absolute sardines on tube on the way back into the you know main touristy part of London but it was ripples. Well worth it because it was like you know drews. 30:03.24 Drew Yeah, that's the most crowded I've ever been on the two because they were fitting every person humanly possible on every one of the trains and you had like you know forty fifty Thousand people leaving a stadium and they have 2 stations on each side of the stadium that usually service the game. 30:09.39 Sam Oh yeah. 30:23.20 Sam No. 30:23.21 Drew But 1 of them was down so every he was going to the one and it's their arsenal's the only team with a tube station named after the team so it was great I loved it. Sometimes. 30:30.21 Hayley Now you got so it it was like Drew's super bowl or something you know he's like. 30:30.36 Sam Oh coong. 30:37.65 dclduo Well and and you rounded out your evening with what the ah the british like to call a proper curry. Ah so ah, went to one of our favorite indian spots. The Punjab restaurant 1 of it was it the oldest northern indian cuisine in London um, so. 30:40.56 Drew Yes. 30:52.99 dclduo A great spot for Indian dinner and in our and our opinion would you guys think. 30:57.95 Drew Yes, we ended our night with a proper us as we like to say our last name is curry. So um, yeah, so. 31:04.67 dclduo Ah. 31:05.22 Sam That's right now you didn't need it didn't even occur to me true. But that makes sense and that's really cute I Love it. 31:11.68 Drew Yeah, so we we love the Punjab we went there back in September and so we had to go back. Get some cheese on that's the thing that I feel like really stands out there of course their indian food is great but the cheese non is not something we can get anywhere around here. So that was always a highlight and we look forward to it and. 31:31.57 Hayley Yeah, luckily we did not have to wait very long to get in, especially it's a party of 2 so you know they everybody always talks about dishu and I I still want to try toroom sometime because it it does look great, but it was really nice to just be able to walk right in and. 31:31.60 Drew Love the Putin job. 31:34.40 Sam Um, also. 31:45.95 Sam Yeah. 31:48.71 Hayley Or but you know maybe wait like 10 or 15 minutes but that wasn't bad. So um. 31:51.30 Sam Yeah, you see de Schum always has like you know an hour plus wait. Yeah. 31:53.73 Drew And ridiculous. You know. 31:55.48 Hayley So exactly. 31:57.54 dclduo Well yeah, and and and just so folks don't think that we're sending them to a like a divey place that doesn't have like there. There's usually a line at the pun job. It just moves pretty quickly because there's it's a big restaurant. Um, so yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 32:03.21 Hayley And there was yeah they've got a lot of of space in there. So. 32:03.50 Sam Yeah. 32:06.33 Drew Um, yeah, hey and with only 2 of us. There's a lot of rooms tables for like 2 if you're a bigger family. There was a much bigger line for like 4 5 6 people than there was the 2 people line. So. 32:16.84 Sam Yeah. 32:18.75 dclduo Yeah, well and we know in your last day in London you did 2 things that are Sam's favorite things to do one is the Harry Potter studio tour so want to talk folks about what you got up to there. 32:19.31 Hayley Yeah, that's true. That's true. 32:32.20 Sam This is basically my perfect day I just want to tell you like your last day in London the only the only thing that would have made it better and it's not possible to do this and also do the Harry Potter Harry Potter studio tour um but the only. 32:35.37 Drew Um. 32:46.12 Sam Ah, addition would be going to fortnham and mason for tea but literally other than that this is like my perfect day in London. 32:49.64 Drew Um. 32:54.84 Drew Um, yeah, so go ahead. Haley. 32:54.89 Hayley Yeah, so we did go ahead. Okay, we did do the the Warner Brothers studios tour the making of Harry Potter it's like a Disney attraction. It has like a long name with a coal in the middle. So you know what I mean business. But um. 33:09.71 Sam Um. 33:09.91 Hayley That was I mean we are millennials so we grew up on Harry Potter um I went to midnight release book parties in like high school for some of the books. Yes, so um, you know it's it's a formative part of my life and Andrew's life and. 33:16.82 Sam Same but in college Haley same think. 33:20.28 Drew Um, and. 33:28.12 Hayley We didn't get to do it on our last trip because my parents were with us and my mom likes Harry Potter my dad could not care less so we weren't going to force him although we did end up going to the curse child parts one and two back in the fall. So my dad just like wandered around by himself and was very happy to do it after all of the organized tours. So anyway. 33:38.10 Drew Um, this is. 33:47.55 Hayley Um, Drew's like we got to you got to move this on. So ah, we took a bus tour through golden tours that took us up to then we we met it like right across from the Victoria Coach station and it took us up to the studios tour and we had like. 34:01.94 Drew 3 hours maybe it was yeah right. 34:06.31 Hayley More like 4 or 5 in the air. 34:07.95 Sam It's usually four so that it's actually what the because the ticket is it's technically a 4 hour ticket 34:11.24 Hayley Okay, and we we did buy the audio guide. There was no way we were gonna make it through all of the audio guide material. Um, so if you're like me and you're like ah an a plus student and you're like but I need to do all the things you're gonna be really disappointed if you get the audio guide because it gets got. 34:19.29 Sam Yep. 34:28.90 Sam It's really yeah. 34:31.18 Hayley And cool stuff. It's got like video interviews with people and that's really neat but you're not able to get through all of it and then it's going to stress you out that you didn't get through all of it. So I think you can probably skip it. Um, unless you have like more time there than we had. But. 34:46.15 Drew Yeah, and I I don't want to get into specifics and spoil some of the things you get to see because there's some like some of the sets that you get to walk on and see and reveals are really cool and and pretty special and so. But it was incredible to see like all these things you've seen in the movies and things like that and get to actually walk through some of them and see a lot of the ones. Ah, and I really liked some of the things that I really liked was the the creature shop where you get to see how they made. 35:19.70 Sam Ah, yeah. 35:20.66 Drew All the different creatures and made a move and things like that and then also the scale models some of the scale models of the things that they built in giant were were pretty impressive and incredible. So the details about some of the magic quote unquote magic things that happen that you get to see. 35:24.94 Sam Oh yeah. 35:31.60 Hayley And those are cool. 35:40.19 Drew It was It was spectacular and if you're a fan in any way I Definitely think it's worth the time to get out there and get back to be able to see it. 35:47.77 Sam I agree it really does take up most of the day because of the drive to and from London um, but it is well worth it. It's a really cool experience for I agree with you guys though? if you're not a Harry Potter fan at all. Don't do it. You'll think it's a waste of the day. 35:49.79 Hayley Definitely. 35:53.32 Hayley So yep. 36:06.14 Sam But if you heard at all a Harry Potter fan it's fantastic it's just an incredible experience and it's I agree. It's not long enough. You don't have enough time and that's just by virtue of what the ticket is it really is a 4 hour ticket so um frankly for somebody like me and probably you guys too I could have spent I could have spent 10 hours there and I probably still wouldn't have seen everything. Yeah. 36:25.94 Drew Um, yeah, yeah. 36:27.69 Hayley Yeah, it's true. Um, there's only 1 place to buy butter beer and it is at the cafe that is right in the middle and there's like a special butter beer only line but they don't take card. They only take cash. So if you are wanting multiple butter beers but you don't want to wait in the long line that also includes food. 36:34.22 Sam Yep. 36:38.76 Drew Um, yeah, it was weird. 36:45.20 Hayley But the one that you can pay by credit card takes some some cash which we did not have so that you yeah and we're only going to be there for a couple days and you know there's not much tipping that happens in the U k. 36:48.81 Drew We got some euros but we didn't grab any pounds because we were like we're not going to need any in London. 36:52.28 Sam Yeah. 36:53.42 dclduo No. 37:01.56 Hayley So it's not like and we were saying in this cheap hotel so we weren't going to have a bell hop to to so pay or anything like that so we were like we don't need any the butterbeer ice cream is better than the butterbeer drink in my opinion. Um, and I will say too that if you. 37:06.68 Sam Um, but the but the butter beer ice cream was fantastic I have to say yeah. 37:12.20 Drew Um, yes, yes. 37:19.52 Hayley Are a person who does not foresee being able to make it to London anytime soon. Honestly, a lot of what they've done in universal studios or universal Orlando is really really good. A really good. 37:29.60 Sam This is. 37:33.60 Hayley Facsimile will say of what they have at the studio tour. So some of the sets I was like I've been here in Florida like like it was like less exciting because they did such a great job at universal so a plug for universal, well done to them because their lands are really fantastic for. 37:51.54 Sam Yeah I I have to agree with you I mean it's it's it's not a Disney product. But um, the Harry Potter world at at universal or Orlando is is pretty incredible. Yeah. 37:52.25 Hayley And and you don't have to travel across the ocean. 38:01.67 Hayley Yeah I mean I I would put that up against all basically any place at Wal Disney World not the whole park just that section. 38:07.50 Sam Yeah, yep. 38:10.34 dclduo Well you rounded out your day by seeing back to the future the musical which I will say I am not the biggest Broadway person as sam knows and as most of our listener knows. But oh man did we love back to the future of the musical. So. 38:21.49 Hayley And. 38:26.60 dclduo What did you all think about back to the future of the musical. 38:29.98 Drew It was fantastic. Yeah I loved it. The songs the music were all great choices and I feel like you know they changed the story enough in the right ways to make it approachable from a musical stance and so that was a great job and ah. 38:38.60 Sam Is it. 38:46.60 Sam The delorean. 38:47.42 Drew The delorean I won't go it like what Happenss but the delorean is just like how it works in the show is incredible. Um, and seeing it I I'm a big advocate of seeing shows in theaters that are built out for them like lots. All we saw the lan rouge. 38:53.91 Hayley But it's so good and I. 38:54.27 Sam Yeah. 39:01.56 Sam Is. 39:06.30 Drew In London and they actually have the giant windmill built in the theater here. They have all these special effects that you're not going to get anywhere else with like when it comes on tour and things we're seeing it in Charlotte when it comes on tour but it's not going to have those facts. 39:10.40 Sam Yep. 39:16.55 Sam Yep. 39:22.12 Sam It's not going to. It will have some special effects but it probably will not have the level of of special effects that it has in London or that it will have in New York because in New York there it's going to be I think at the winter garden theater. Um, ah if I'm not mistaken which is where cats was for many many many many years. 39:24.13 Drew Right. 39:31.80 Drew Um, what. 39:40.14 Sam And um and if they I have so assuming they're going to fully build it out like they did for the London show and the screens and yeah, it's just yeah. 39:46.67 Drew Um, yeah with the lights coming into the theater and yeah, incredible. Yeah, it's coming soon. 39:48.30 Hayley Yeah I don'tly they have the screens on tour but we can report back. Um, and and at least we can report back in the Facebook group. Um, and if for anyone who cares the the dcl do a podcast Facebook group shameless plug. Um, yeah, so we can report back about that. But we. 39:57.26 Sam Love it. Thank you! We love it. 40:05.42 Drew Um, what did you think really. 40:07.66 Hayley Also single on rouge on tour. But yes, great show incredible. The cast was phenomenal. Um I really appreciate that the songs were like 95 plus percent original songs written for the show Drew and I are not as big on the jukebox musical format. 40:16.77 Sam Is it. 40:23.50 Hayley Because I feel like you have to shoehorn like the plot around the songs that you want to use and I don't feel like that serves the story. Well most of the time. But so I like that they wrote songs for this show to be able to tell the story the right way but the the energy of the of the actor who played Marty Mcfly was just perfection. 40:28.70 Sam Yep. 40:40.90 Drew Um, perfect for Covid. Yes. 40:42.84 Hayley The energy of Doc Brown was also perfection and George Mcfly also perfection like just it was just so good. It just so much joy coming from both of us watching it. We had the best time. Um, highly recommend it and like Drew said there's some really amazing technical. 40:43.66 Sam So good. Yeah. 41:01.66 Hayley Theater with things I'm also a theater geek. So there's some really amazing like stagecraft that happens that we won't spoil but it's just just go see and if you can go see it see it in New York see it in London see it in the city near you just see the see the musical. It's great. 41:14.71 Drew Yeah, if you like the if you like the movie at all, you have to see the musical. 41:15.90 dclduo Nice. 41:20.30 Sam Yes, that's how I feel about it Drew it's like is it does it beat um, you know Hamilton or come from a way. No, but if you like this movie. Like you are going to really enjoy this musical like it's just really fun. It's just a fun enjoyable experience. Yeah. 41:33.80 Drew Um, yes. 41:34.29 Hayley It's just so fun. Fun is a great way to put it like is it the deepest show out there. No is it like you know the artistic merit of it are they going to be writing about it in the history books maybe not but are you going to have an absolute blast. 41:40.95 Drew Pass. 41:46.40 Sam Right? Yeah, probably not totally totally. 41:51.78 Hayley Yes, you will? yeah. 41:53.65 dclduo Well Drew Haley thank you so much for spending some additional time with us today to talk about your pre and pro. Well Drew Haley thank you so much for spending some additional time with us today to talk about your pre and. Post cruise stays in Barcelona and London we really really appreciate you sharing the experience with all of our listeners. 42:15.86 Hayley So oh our plug. 42:17.36 Sam And yeah, and and I bet the kickbacks from Rick Steves are coming to you soon. 42:17.82 Drew Um, thanks for having us. Um, yes, we'll be on walking for the checks in the mail. 42:23.75 Hayley You're hoping here's hoping maybe that's the name of the episode is like and know honorary Rick Steveeves affiliates or something who knows. 42:31.95 Sam Ah. 42:32.31 dclduo Ah.