Roman Holiday

First off, I must say that we went to Theatreland in the week to see 2.22 and I managed to find the last base of the Soho Stories AL series.

Right on to today; due to so much going on in the week, it's worked out that Saturday would be my caching day but I wont be going out tomorrow.🙁 There were a couple of events in town today and if I attended one, I would have attended 100 events which qualified me for a couple of Challenge caches.😀 I was also looking for an opportunity to have a crack at the EU : Challenge series around the Victoria Docks.🤔

I was up nice and early and got to my first port of call, Mile End Station at 0725. I wanted to do the Mile End and Bow Wander AL series and weave a few trads in on the way. I visited all the bases and added five trads to the list. However there was a bonus for the ALs but it was missing. What a disappointment! 🥴

I walked south into Bow Cemetery Park for the 3.5/3 trad. What a cunning cache but I was up for it.😀 I was hoping to walk down the side of the Limehouse Cut to Limehouse Station (or Stepney East Station as it used to be) collecting some of the Call The Midwife AL series but I only managed one - Limehouse Cut & Stinkhouse Bridge due to time constraints. 

I reached as far as the Commercial Road Bridge and picked up the cunningly placed trad before jumping a bus to take me to Aldgate bus garage. I was due to attend an event at ten and I just got there in time with a coffee in hand. Mr Goldpot had organised Romanus eunt domus at the Roman Wall next to Tower Hill Station. There was a good turnout and I had a good chat with several of the London cachers who I am getting to know as well as a new face - Young Heed, hiya Will.👋

When the meeting broke up just before eleven, I dropped down into the Tower of London to gain another clue for the One Day in London multi and walked back to the Tower Gateway DLR station. I got off the DLR at Royal Victoria and quickly found the ST trad. I then headed down to Excel West and found my first EU : Challenge - Slovakia.😀 The idea of the series is to have found three caches in each of the 27 EU countries. I think I had qualified for about 18 with only two caches in a couple of countries and none in a few.🥴 Hopefully I will address the balance some day. I only have two in Sweden but I can't see me getting back there anytime soon.☹️

I quickly found the Excel West trad before setting off on a long wander of the Docks visiting EU countries.😀 I got up to Sweden and had a break from travelling to collect three bases of the London Cable Car AL series. I jumped a DLR and got off at the London City Airport station where I had lunch in a Costa. From here, I crossed the Connaught Bridge and sorted out the Up and Over multi. I was a bit cheeky here as the Croatia Challenge was near here but as the area had been fenced off for remedial work, the cache had been disabled. There was no work going on today so I snuck through the fence.

I carried on visiting countries until I got up to Gallions Reach DLR where I jumped a train up to the end of the line at Beckton. I was after two caches here, one a 2007 vintage mystery and the Beckton Gas Works Gate trad. I swiftly spotted the trad and took a TB to move on but couldn't see the mystery. It was obvious that I was in the wrong place and I soon realised that I had solved the puzzle ok but had East instead of West in the coords.🤬🤬

I caught the train back to Gallions Reach and soon visited Portugal. There was a cunningly placed trad on the bridge straddling the Royal Albert Dock which was soon spotted. I carried on, visiting France, Czechia, Latvia and Estonia before deciding that I'd had enough for the day. I found myself at the northern terminal of the Woolwich Ferry. This was the first time that I had been here and was amazed at the size of these ferries. I walked up to the King George V DLR and headed for home.

It wasn't until I was writing notes for this blog on the C2C train going home that I realised that I had missed out visiting Finland and I was qualified for this one.🤬🤬

1 Event 1 Multi 9 AdLab 11 Traditional 18 Mystery

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