Not enjoyable, not cheap and not recommended. Renewing one's passport for a certain country requires a trip in person, meaning Pugsley guzzled about £60 worth of fuel while tootling across the country. Me being me, I was willing to walk an hour if I found not-£20-parking, so I researched it last night and selected four streets that seemed to have little or no restrictions - and yes, this took well over an hour of looking on Google Maps. Well! It turns out that I also had to (1) figure out the difference between the London Congestion Charge, the Low-Emissions Zone and the Ultra-Low-Emissions Zone, and (2) try to avoid getting an extortionate corresponding charge, all while navigating stupid London traffic and (3) getting lost and going the wrong way over and over again. It turns out that I just had to stay out of the ULED (easier said than done) and which meant I was actually an 80min walk from the consulate. Fine! Oh yeah, in the rain. And parking the car just 80 minutes before my appointment.
I walk/skipped/ran the entire way and made it in the nick of time, and my typical ankle reaction was I now hate you and I'm not playing this game anymore and so by the time I was walking back to the car it was stiff, sore and uncooperative. While I was getting rained on. And busting for a wee.
I decided my three hours of walking earned me a takeaway and I'm not even sorry. ULEZ + parking would have set me back about £30-40 so I don't even care that I threw £5 of my £20 weekly food money on one meal. I had also intended on paying for priority processing, but it turns out I saved myself another £20 because the current wait time is super quick.
At least there was lovely scenery walking along the Thames. Still, it was really not worth it 😂
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