Cash, cards and coffee

Things may have improved a little (I hope), since 2007, when the standard of coffee was crap in the UK. On arrival at Heathrow and transferring to the flight to Edinburgh, we found a coffee bar (Costas) in the waiting lounge. I was asked if we wanted the coffee made with cold or hot milk (???), and then was served two enormous insipid milky concoctions which were just terrible. Not quite what you need when you've just come off a long flight!!!

We soon learned we would have to ask for "double shots" to get anywhere near the strength we like. Things were better in Edinburgh, but to get a better coffee we had to use Starbucks, (Lee thinks she remembers it wasn't Starbucks, but some other "chain", and the coffee was equally bad, frothy, milky and WEAK! (We have since found out they, Starbucks, are either owned or are supported by some religious organisation, and that goes against the grain with me). When we had our self-catering places we made sure we had our own preferred Moccona brand, and that at least got us through. However, for the rest of the two months, we started having drip-filter or plunger coffee, and/or tea.

When we were supposed to go to the UK this year, (deferred by the death of Samuel), we bought 1,000 British Pounds, and at the time got them at a good rate, but of course since then the rate has gotten even better, but you never know these things ahead of time. So, we will just divide the notes between us and will have some money to go on with when we land. The other thing it has been suggested we do is to arrange one of those Cash Passports where you put your own money on it, and then use it just like a cash card. Sounds good, so we might do that. It also spreads the money over several cards, so if you lose one you still have some to go on with.

With the stopovers in Japan, we will just use their ATM's or whatever, and get what we need, and we can also do this on the cruise to Norway. It doesn't seem worthwhile purchasing Yen or Kroner beforehand, just for some small parts of the holiday.