Cheerio London!

We'd seen enough of London and all its wonder, so we decided to hire a taxi, rent a car, and head up the coast to Scotland. But first we had to make it to the car rental at the airport.

It turns out National Rental Car didn't know what they were in for when we showed up. The turban clad taxi driver who looked around for a trolley when he started to unload our luggage should have given us some clue, but we didn't notice. Like good Battys, we didn't acknowledge any of the stares the other tourists gave us as they cleared the aisles for Sue and Edie pushing now full shopping cart sized trolleys through the narrow glass sliding doors. Only one woman gasped, "Oh my god!" Fortunately, we had upgraded to an Audi sadan something or other with a navigation system. And, thankfully we had that little piece of technology!

Our combined luggage

Edie sat in this little tiny space

With Kim in the driver's seat, Deb sitting shotgun, Sue navigating from behind, and Edie offering support from under all the carry-on luggage, we were ready to begin. It didn't matter that we didn't know how to turn on the car with its fancy key fob. We took those extra few minutes to smell the fine grained leather and start laughing. Finally, Deb pushed that key fob sucker into the ignition, and the car roared to life! Phew, we were off. With a death grip, I clutched the steering wheel and pulled ahead ever so slowly.

Yep, I'm definitely stressed!

It didn't take long for us to get lost. Instantly, I freaked out from driving on the wrong side of the road, ignored the GPS, and one roundabout later we were circling a business park. While sitting in the parking lot wondering what to do next, Sue casually said from the back seat, "I told you to follow the bus."

I sighed, but laughed inside:).

As we slowly made our way back toward the airport along the access roads, Deb added, "Is that plane coming right at us?"
Edie exclaimed, "Watch out!"

The very nice man helping us load our luggage

I tried deep breathing just like my yoga teacher told me to during high stress situations. Instead, I reverted to my Batty roots and shouted, "Stop talking! Only Sue and Deb can talk."

Deb took advantage of this and snapped, "And don't talk to your mother like that!"

Suddenly, our three and a half hour drive to Chester sounded like it would take a whole lot longer.