After writing about my visit to Liverpool last December, I mentioned that I planned for 2025 to be my year of visiting as many cities in the UK as I could. Instead, my boss took me on an unplanned week away to Turkey as thanks, but on my arrival home, I found out my mum had been diagnosed with cancer. I only managed to book two trips, which were to Scarborough for the day back in August, and Bury a few weeks later. But who needs planning, right? Well, it turns out that I shouldn’t have thought about planning and just let things happen, because that is how things have been this year, so far. I was invited to tag along to a weekend away in London with some friends who wanted to visit MCM Comic Con and do a little sightseeing along the way. Who would say no?
So the weekend finally came, and despite thoroughly enjoying myself, I’m feeling a little remorseful that I didn’t plan what I wanted to see, but worse still, I didn’t plan or prepare much at all. I took the necessities with me, along with my camera, spare batteries, and extra SD cards. I had everything that I needed. We hopped into Tony’s Tesla and hammered it all the way down the M1 and arrived several hours later. After checking in at the hotel, we decided to head out into London and start our pub crawl. This is when I realised that I should’ve brought my camera. I managed to get by with my trusty iPhone 15 Pro Max, but I just know that, if I’d have brought my Canon, I wouldn’t have drank as much, and would’ve had a much better time taking photos. In hindsight, I should’ve just taken my camera in my backpack, which is what I did on Saturday without any issues. Kind of.
We arrived in Covent Garden, and this is when I found myself missing my camera the most. I took part in a street performance from the balcony of The Punch and Judy, which was a ton of fun, involving tossing balls to a juggler who was in front of St. Paul’s Church. I would’ve preferred to have been taking photos of his performance over taking part in it, to be completely honest.
We mooched around more of London, visiting various alcohol serving establishments, and we even managed to pay a visit to Bunga ’90, which was a cool experience, but would’ve been better had the arcade machines been in full working order. Each game that we played had a fault, even the giant LiteBrite on the wall. We didn’t spend very long in Bunga ’90 as the staff were very abrupt with us after we wandered to a ‘private area’ which wasn’t signposted, and had a lot of other patrons in. We took that as our sign to leave and moved on, making a few more stops before heading back to the hotel and getting some much-needed sleep.
As we all woke up the next day, we knew that we were going to MCM Comic Con, so we freshened up and headed out, this time having my camera with me. I took a lot of photos on our way to the ExCeL Centre as we travelled from Archway. I was finally doing with I had wanted to do from the very beginning. Having my backpack with me meant that I could put my camera away, change lenses if needed, and have any other gear with me, but after a few hours of taking portraits of Cosplayers and trying to capture the vibe and chaos of the event, I realised something that broke my spirit. I had forgotten to pack my spare batteries and left them at the hotel. My low battery warning began to flash, so I put my camera away and tried to use my phone for everything else, only using the camera very selectively.
We stayed at the convention for several more hours before heading back into central London for the remainder of the night. I was hoping that we would go back to the hotel, but nobody wanted to go back until the end of the day. In hindsight, I should’ve just gone back on my own, but we only had one key between the four of us, and I didn’t want to risk being the one to lose it, or something like that. We finished off the night with a meal at Hard Rock Cafe in Piccadilly, and called in at The World’s End before calling it a night.
As soon as we got back to the hotel, I loaded my SD card into my phone and began looking at what I had taken. Typically, I had run out of battery just as I was getting into the groove, and it was obvious when reviewing the photos. I did get some really cool portraits, and some ideas were flowing, but I would’ve continued to take better photos as the day progressed had I taken my extra batteries with me. I was gutted, to say the least.
Our last morning came, and we had planned to go to Highgate Cemetery to have a look around and visit Karl Marx’s tomb, but sadly, we didn’t get around to visiting, as we were very early, and the cemetery doesn’t open until 10:00 am. We wandered around aimlessly before heading back to the hotel to check out and go home. It wasn’t until we were almost home that Tony said that they normally go back into central London for a few more hours before heading back. I was upset that this wasn’t given as an option; otherwise, I would’ve happily stayed for a few more hours. Oh well, it was too late by that point.
There was so much that I would’ve loved to have seen, so many things I would’ve done differently, like taking my extra batteries. Suffice to say, I will be returning to London, and hopefully making it a yearly trip, at least for a weekend, and much better planned out and photography-oriented.
Regardless of the setbacks, I had a great time and just appreciated it for what the weekend was at its core – a chance to get away. I’m thankful for my friends who invited me, the experiences shared, and certainly to have gotten away from what has been easily the most stressful year of my life. London, I will be back.
I only have one more trip that, yet again, wasn’t actually planned, and I will talk about it after it has happened as another retrospective blog. So, I’m going to say it again. 2026 will be better planned out, with more trips, and hopefully, if all goes as planned, a lot of unplanned trips. We will see what the future brings, but my fingers are now tightly crossed.
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SB.P 