Day 1 - London - A new year a new ghost hunt

A new year and a new start to the blog.  I am back on my travels again and this time in good old blighty and London.

As it was Monday it was travel day and after my normal commute from Goole to Doncaster it was the turn of Grand Central trains to whisk me to London for the princely sum of £30.00, which they did admirable and without incident, depositing me at Kings Cross bang on time.  It was time for work.

Having been given an opportunity to have a bad cold by the gods that be, I was pretty fed up by 5.30 p.m. and as my Liverpool colleague had suggested we meet for dinner and he was bringing along an ex colleague of his how now works for another company in London.  Normally feeling this bad I would have declined and spent the night in my room but as I have ulterior motives then I decided I would attend the dinner invitation.  My ulterior motive being that I am hoping to look for another job and leave my current company and making contacts is basically what it is about.

I arrived at the hotel and checked in, I have been at this hotel, the Holiday Inn on Coram Street many times over the past year but this was the first time I had got on the 6^th floor and what apparently are the best rooms in the hotel.  A hallway as you enter the room followed by a lounge and then the bed room part, very nice indeed.

All this made me wish even more that I was not heading out of the door some 45 minutes later.  Only having time for a quick wash and brush up I did notice the bath robe and slippers behind the door and god damn I was doing to use them.  The slippers on the robe.

Reshod into my trainers I left the room and headed to Russel Sq tube station for the journey to Pimlico.  It was the first time at this station and it took me a further 15 minutes to find the restaurant which had been chosen, but I did and arrived in last place, with the first two having already ordered starters and eating it.  That did not bother me as my budget and appetite (having a bad cold) did not stretch to a starter.

I was introduced to my Liverpool colleagues ex colleague (getting confusing) and found him to be a very confident person which he proved as I asked him about his work background in the company I am in now and he gave me a 15 minute presentation which left nothing out. His ease of talking did make it more interesting and he was very easy to get on with.  So we had a nice evening even if it was talking about work. I did notice how all past work looked better when talking about it, perhaps rose tinted glasses works for projects as well as other things in life.

We left dinner at 9.30 p.m. and parted company with my Liverpool colleague’s ex colleague and he wanted a night cap so moved along London’s mill bank area to a pub called the Morpeth Arms.  What was special about this pub is that the history of the area which I picked up as follows:-

Millbank was originally a huge prison and I was told one of the biggest in the country.  When it was full around three ships were moored in the river and prisoners held on board.  It was notorious because the inmates basically lived aboard with no water or sanitation and the boats could be smelt from over a mile away.  Eventually the inmates were hosed down and the ships left bound for Australia with the ones that survived the trip colonizing the continent.

The pub has a number of television screens which show the catacombs below the pub which was used to move the prisoners to the ships and is now thought to be haunted and one can sit in the pub drinking ale and watching for ghosts, I assume the sightings of ghosts increase with the number of ales one consumes.  I have to report I saw nothing but only had one drink whilst in there and that may have been the problem.

At around 10.00 p.m. I set off in search of Pimlico tube station and having located said station I progressed home with other weary travellers.  Finally arriving in my hotel room at 10:15 p.m. and time to enjoy my executive room for an hour before the executive bed called.