h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You can find my photo's at

http://arith.fotki.com

when I done em.

Sorry you had such a journey back to the hotel Paul - we should have gone together, but when I left I think you'd already disappeared.

The tube map is pretty simple if everything is working, but it can get more complicated to work out routes when lines are closed. I tend to use an iPhone app (Tube Deluxe) which knows what lines are out of action, and can also work out the length of the journey. The zones are numbered from the centre out, and are shown in different colours on the larger tube maps. You need to check which is the furthest out zone you're travelling to when you buy a ticket.

I think the Clic Sargent pen's probably mine - it's not worth anything, no sentimental value (I go to a lot of Clic events so I'm always stocking up on more pens!) so please feel free to adopt it

This is me looking for yous lot in trafalger wotsit; I'm the one in red, everybody keeps running away

which ones are you then

http://images9.fotki.com/v131/photos/1/1529911/9740861/_MG_2208RedM_hfcopy-vi.jpg

That's Westminster Morris, in the yellow and black tabards. I'd be just off-camera on the right, with the musicians.

They are a little too far away (and good) for me to join, but I have e-mailed my local side in Hammersmith to see if I can join them.

Be good to get back to it. Hadn't realised, until Saturday, how much I miss it.

MMF

Pirate LeGray somebody pointed you out to me at the Shakespeare's Head, but by the time I went over to say hello, you'd disappeared.

Us pirates are like that

I am glad the crew of The Blood of the Zaphodistas was represented by such fine members as PAL and Paulh

I thought the Westminster Morris men was in the house of commons but I did enjoy watching it and was sad to not be able to return at 5 'o' clock.

On a bus to Holborn then. In fact I caught loads of buses all of them clean and modern with sound and vision, using an oyster pay as you go card, got discount on the boat and it all cost £4.

It would cost the same at home, but on stinky smelly old packed buses that can't be bothered to turn up.

Paying for each trip would have cost over £16 here and more in London.

So one of my better decisions

"Pirate LeGray somebody pointed you out to me at the Shakespeare's Head, but by the time I went over to say hello, you'd disappeared."

yep, it is because I had an advance ticket which was about £110 cheaper, although they said I saved £270.

I'm a bit disabled and that was the furthest I'd been in ten years, although I was in central London if Camden or Kew or that place where Mr Galloway was an MP I can't remember but Guinness is there, are central, five days a week upsetting the locals with my 14 wheeler 6 axle vehicle.

Taxi drivers get really upset with chimes of, 'where did you learn to drive,' ect ect. But London bus drivers are fantastic.

"The tube map is pretty simple if everything is working, but it can get more complicated to work out routes when lines are closed. I tend to use an iPhone app (Tube Deluxe) which knows what lines are out of action, and can also work out the length of the journey. The zones are numbered from the centre out, and are shown in different colours on the larger tube maps. You need to check which is the furthest out zone you're travelling to when you buy a ticket"

Thanks for explaining, Beatrice. I was in a state of chronic sensory overload most of the time I was in London. Given more time, I would have gradually figured everything out. I didn't see any maps of the zones anywhere on the walls of the Underground. There was one chart that I saw, but there was never enough time to really scrutinize it. I'll be back again someday, hopefully. The London Underground has a lot of similarities with the Boston MBTA, which I mastered pretty well. London has a lot more lines, though. I could navigate them okay during the week, but being there on a weekend, when two-thirds of the lines that went to my area were closed?

I found the secret to navigating the London underground (tube), plus london over ground (rail), and bus routes, is to just find yourself a local and force them to nnavigate you through it all... failing which I just ask someone who looks like they might work on the transport system in some capicity

I spend hours meticulously poring over tube and bus maps and learning road names and bus stop locations by heart. I accept that a transit system which shunts millions of people daily is necessarily going to be complicated.

I find the London tube to be fairly easy to use on weekdays - just like the ones in Berlin and Paris - but during the weekends is quite another ballgame since every second line is down and you have to wiggle your way around

But they say that after the olympics next summer everything should be okay again. Looking forward to that

This raises a question, though: Should we move the meet out of London next summer so as not to collide with the olympics, you think?

As the Meet is now usually in May, it is 3 months before the Olympics, so should be .

I was wondering, would the notes I made for the walk be worth expanding and turning into an entry? Feedback appreciated. OPn the entry, rather than the walk.



MMF

Thank you for that information, MMF, it takes a worry off my shoulder

Welcome. At least I've only applied for tickets for the Rowing, at Eton, so heading OUT of London, not in!

MMF

"I was wondering, would the notes I made for the walk be worth expanding and turning into an entry?" [MMF]

I think it would make a great entry, especially useful for people in London for the first time. There could be little pictures of the various statues and plinths and buildings along the way. I'm on the fence about the improbable nose, though.

Definately... and not just* because I want to know more on the nose

I think that's a really really good idea.

Can't wait to see the entry..

I thought that bit was EXACTLY like the site - interesting and informative stuff at one end and a thread of researchers drifting around at the other.

In the meantime, here are my photos.

https://picasaweb.google.com/112662984539688033472/H2G2MeetMay15th2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCJuiwbK3_o_ioAE#

Er...

http://picasaweb.google.com/112662984539688033472/H2G2MeetMay15th2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCJuiwbK3_o_ioAE#