££££ondon

You think New York's expensive? Some Londoners fly to New York once a year to buy their new wardrobe. It's cheaper to buy them in the States, even when you add in the plane ticket.

Upset at the latest T fare-hike in Boston to $1.25 for a one-way ride? Try out the £4 one-way ticket on the Tube (~$7.80).

London is prohibitively expensive. My best friend here in Spain, Alex, told me he had two equal 'vacation budgets.' One was for 6 months of day-trips to Spanish towns, carnivals, fairs, bullfights, and accompanying friends to Morocco to buy rugs. The other was for 1 week in London.

British pounds themselves don't travel far in London. American dollars might as well be 1932 German Marks - you'd need a wheelbarrow to buy anything with 'em. Becka paid $12 for £4 at the airport despite my warnings not to exchange money there (in her defense, apparently Heathrow Airport has neglected to put in ATMs). That's a $3 to £1 exchange rate for those of you keeping score at home. That's incredibly ridiculous.

A weak dollar is one thing. The dollar's weaker than the Euro, but in places like Spain, the prices are adjusted accordingly. A beer might cost €1.20 here. That's still less than $2 for a 12-oz Bud light. But having the quantity of currency demanded be the same will just about ruin you. What costs $1 for me often costs £1 in London, effectively halving my money.

An example to illustrate. A regular french fry at a Burger King (something I regrettably had to order while waiting for Becka to arrive via the tube) might cost me $1.25 in the states. It cost £1.25 here. So I paid about $2.40 for my fries. And that's the way it is with most products. You're paying the same number, but it costs twice as much to you.

This, of course, means one of two things. Either you don't do anything in London, or you hemmorhage cash. We chose the latter.

Our hotel was just down the mini-times square ads on the left

Not without some resistance, however. We stayed in a cheap hotel, sacrificing en suite toilets and showers (meaning we had to phone reception to ask for towels and an unlocking of a shower stall, not quite the quaint bed-and-breakfast experience) for location (quite literally in Picaddilly Circus) and price (although I'd hate to see the $60/night rooms...). And I managed to nail 4 of the quite famous (and fully free) museums, seeing the Rosetta Stone (British Musuem), some Picasso/Dalí modern art (Tate Modern), fake dinosaur bones at the Natural Science Museum (seriously - a huge letdown), and a portrait gallery of all the monarchs/famous people of English history.

Some of the bleeding was expected. £15 to see the Tower of London, £10 to see Westminster Abbey, and £15 to see Coriolanus at Shakespeare's Globe theatre were all planned expenditures. But some of it was not. Like the $17 bagels we bought on our way out.

That's right. $17 for two plain bagels with cream cheese. If you took me to the best Jewish bagel shop in NY and told me that they're the most expensive bagels in the world, I'd guess they might be about $5 a pop. $10 total. And maybe I would've paid it, just to try the "best bagels in the world."

But what we had surely were not at the top of any Zagat survey or Michelin guide. I even think the place we went to was a chain. Becka was starving and ornery and we just thought we'd stop at the bagel/donut shop right outside our hotel. I remember noting that the donuts were £1.50 and I thought that was a bit high, but well within the range of acceptably inflated London prices.
Becka and I both decided we'd do bagels and cream cheese instead, figuring they'd be about the same. When we noticed she wasn't reaching into the big basket of fresh bagels and tub of smooth cream cheese, we started to be concerned. She grabbed for a bagel from the display shelf that was fully made up with cream cheese and lettuce. I gathered that we would be getting that, sans lettuce. But I was slightly confused why they didn't have fresh bagels and cream cheese when they advertised it outside.

Becka was similarly dazed and forgot to mention she didn't want hers toasted. When they came back in cheap wax paper bags, I admit I hadn't thought through what they could cost. If the donuts were £1.50, it should have been conceivable that the bagels were £2.50 or even £3. Then I would have been thinking that £5 was too much and might have refused them. When she proudly announced £9.90, a full $10 over what I could even think of overpaying, I could have said, "I'm sorry, I didn't ask for a dozen, just one bagel" and left rather dramatically in protest over the high price. Instead what I did was more or less say, "Ok, thanks. Here's your money. Shall I drop my pants and grab my ankles too?"

Truth be told, London was a great time and seeing Becka was worth whatever expenses we incurred. We did a much better mix of touristy things (mentioned before) and spending time together than we did in Paris or Venice, which were maybe a little too amped up with tourist destinations and checklists. Slowly, I'm learning how I need to travel, one little trip at a time. Soon it will be time to put it all into use, as I leave in a little more than three weeks for the Grand Finale.

Well, I should go to make sure I still have money in my bank accounts after the hit I took in London. Hopefully, I'll have enough cash saved up for the seven week trip. Or a week in London.