APRIL 7 - I take bus to the St. Pancras Station to pick of the rental car. Encounter the first malfunction of the trip. Turns out that despite reading through all the contract terms for the Hertz Rental agreements in the UK, and making a double-check call to London from the US prior to the trip, they in fact do not allow their cars to travel to Ireland. No mention of this at all until I was standing at their counter. Since altering the trip around this little problem was not a realistic option, I cast about to the other rental companies in the building and was able to salvage a solution from Europcar. The new deal is almost three times as expensive, and the car smaller (Fiat 500). About two hours are lost in this adventure, after which I do successfully drive out in a car, and back to a park near our hotel where Janet and Odette are waiting.
FUN FACT: Central London has a ‘congestion tax’, which dings anyone driving inside a certain area for GBP 15. Our hotel is inside this zone, but near the edge, so our way around this issue was to park outside the zone and load the car there.
Late afternoon arrive in Bradford-on-Avon, in west Wiltshire. Mike, a friend of mine, lives here with his wife Tanya, and two teenage children. I know Mike from my years working and traveling in southern Africa.
