Days 1-2 in London

All Black Dairy Day 1; Auckland to Heathrow

Thank you to Air New Zealand for a smooth flight on NZ2 to London today. We flew in a Boeing 777-300  which the airline staff were only to proud to tell us was only three weeks old.

The two dozen or so All Black supporters who have paid up on the Williment Travel tour following the 2014 All Blacks to UK, and who flew out of Auckland, were met at Los Angeles Airport by another 30 or so fans who had signed up to take the earlier All Black game in Chicago.  They were all chuffed to have made the extra effort to go to USA and spoke warmly of the reception that had been offered to them by the local Chicago fans and officials. The second group is led by the ex-All Black captain David Loveridge who is as regular in this type of travelling now as he was in his illustrious playing days. Dave and his wife Jan and my wife Anne and I will lead parallel tours for Williments over the next three weekends.

We touched down in the new-look Terminal2 at Heathrow and what a pleasure it was to zoom so speedily through customs and baggage there. It is now such a contrast to the dreary old days of yesteryear there.

We were met by staff of Gulliver's travel and all of us were soon relaxing the comfortable rooms at the Millennium Gloucester Hotel. A smooth flight followed by an efficient welcome and transfer - what more could we weary travellers have asked for?

.....

All Black Diary Day 2; In London

The first people in our party who were down to breakfast might have been the farmers who are used to being up at the crack of dawn but I was not sure of that as I was far from being first to emerge from my room for the day.

Today was a recovery day from the rigors of the long flight. Some of the Dave Loveridge group took the opportunity to go on the underground to see the massive display of poppies (some 880,000 of them) who are planted in the ground at the Tower of London to commemorate the lives lost by the Allied forces in World War I. They came back hugely impressed.

Most of the rest of our people went out in various directions to see the sights of preference in this great city.

Over the road from our hotel we have discovered the Stanhope Hotel which we have already dubbed as our late afternoon meeting point. Tonight it proved a popular first place for people to report on their day's activities and their hopes for the weeks ahead.