Countdown to London

Everything is coming together. Matt and I got our tickets for London squared away today. We're arriving on May 17 and staying through July 12. I have my essential texts lined up: Lonely Planet's Great Britain; Time Out's Country Walks Volume 1 and 1000 Things to Do in London; and Phaidon's Wallpaper* City Guide London 2008. (I bought the last one mostly because it's physically cute, though the architour suggestions are helpful, as is the back flap map. Plus it's made me drool for Peyton & Byrne's baked goods.) My other essential document is a long list of places to see. It's four pages long now and I've been adding to it every week.

In the interest of getting cheap advance fares, I've gone ahead and planned some excursions from London. In addition to heading to Belgrade for Eurovision and then around the neighborhood with Marisa (Banja Luka? Novi Sad?), I'm going to quench my long-standing Crown Dependencies fixation with a trip to Guernsey and Jersey and another to the Isle of Man. I also booked a quick visit to Toulouse, both to see the city and to check out Andorra. Outside of those jaunts—and barring last-minute weekend trips, should they happen—I'm going to stick mostly to England and exclusively to trains.