My birthday in London

On Monday it was my 34th birthday and it was the best birthday I ever had. My husband I had 3 wonderful meals, we walked Festus, I received this amazing flowers, we went for a drive in an F1 simulator and we’ve been to the ceremony of keys at the Tower of London. My husband got tickets for the ceremony of keys in February and he told me we would have made a trip to London. I was ecstatic to see the booking. I tried to get tickets in April for September and it was fully booked until February 2017. There aren’t a lot and the demand is very high. My husband told me in February there were only a few days still available in November and one of them was 14th, my birthday.

In the caravan I don’t have any vases because I couldn’t find a plastic one. So when my husband got these flowers for me I wasn’t sure what to do. He cut a bottle of juice, removed the label and I put the flowers in. We filled the bottom of the vase with small pieces of stone from outside to give it support and this is my vase. I might do a DIY project to make sure I’ll have a vase in the caravan. I like having flowers.

The next thing on our list, after breakfast, was to go to Let’s Race. They have 10 full motion F1 simulators. Last year I’ve been to Donington Park. It seems we are doing racy things on my birthday.

This was my simulator.

It’s not as comfy as one might think. Being an F1 driver is quite hard.

A basic steering wheel with only 4 buttons and only 1 functional. It was hard to drive even with only the Pit button activated. The DRS was activated automatically when I was in the DRS activation zones.
DRS or the Drag Reduction System is a form of driver-adjustable bodywork aimed at reducing aerodynamic drag in order to increase top speed. This will make overtaking easier and it will give better lap times in qualifying. Basically, the rear wing will move when the driver presses the DRS button. Other bodywork adjustments can be made during the race, but only by mechanics at pit-stop.
On the back of the steering wheel are the two paddles to increase and decrease the gears.

Before starting to race. I was expecting I will do an amazing job and I failed. My time laps were very very bad, I managed to bump the car in every lap. I had to go on reverse a few times (more than I want to admit). At one time I raced with my husband and at one time I was driving the wrong way, with some speed I might add. Going into gravel wasn’t a fun experience as the car moved and vibrated.
My best lap time was 3:22.816, at Silverstone. So that means I was 2 minutes slower. It might not seem a lot, but, basically, while I was making my best lap, a real F1 driver would have been able to make 2 laps and a half! I don’t have the data sheet with my husband’s time laps, but he was a minute faster than me.
It was realistic and I loved it. We will go to Let’s race again, it was amazing, a must for anybody that watches F1. The prices are great, I think it’s value for money. The lunch time deal is around £15 per person and I would recommend that to start with.

In the evening, we went to the city centre and we walked around, enjoying the beautiful views and getting excited by the ceremony of keys. As we didn’t think we are going anywhere else, we didn’t have loads of time, but still managed to get a coffee at Coppa.

Without a reservation and having only 25 minutes before we had to go to the Tower, we were very lucky to get a table in one of these igloos. It was very busy, all of them were filled with people enjoying themselves.

The service was fast and the coffee was great. I would love to go back for a meal, maybe next month, when we are in London again. It really seems that we are part-time Londoners as we’ve been to London every month from September.

The ceremony of keys at the Tower of London is a 700 years old tradition. It’s the oldest surviving military tradition in the world.

We weren’t allowed to take pictures or to record. We had a guide that told us a few stories and made jokes. It was amazing to be able to get in the Tower at night, to see the ceremony and learn about it. I think everybody loved it.

After the ceremony, we’ve continued celebrating with a late meal, a delicious dessert, some wine and Cava and movies.