Better write up this hotel review from last month before I find myself back in central London in September staying at a new hotel and taking new walks around a part of the city I have not stayed before. There is a story about how I ended up at Radisson Bu Edwardian Heathrow Hotel that I told last month when I gave up my seat on the United flight to LAX for a $400 denied boarding voucher for my United Airlines LHR-LAX flight and a free hotel night at Radisson Blu Heathrow. Since I was not hindered by my checked bag being held at the airport, I boarded the Underground to spend the day hanging out in central London before I returned to London Heathrow some seven hours later via the Underground. Then I waited for the Hotel Hoppa airport-hotel shuttle bus service operated by National Express to take me to the Radisson Blu Edwardian Heathrow hotel.
An invigorating walk around London covering 10 miles or so had me feeling good, punctuated with Indian food lunch and dinner and several beers along the way in six hours before heading back to LHR on the underground.
I’d been at Harrod’s listening to busker Robin Ward play guitar, chazatronic sing and some guy on violin. Her voice and the song I heard come back to me repeatedly in the month since July 26 standing outside Harrod’s. Here is a short video clip from Robin Ward’s Instagram of the two of them playing a different song, probably that same day in July. My video shows them in the same clothes as the video on his Instagram page.
I picked up the Underground at Knightsbridge Station on Piccadilly Line directly back to London Heathrow Terminal 5.
Hotel Hoppa Hell
The Hotel Hoppa experience changed my mood. The way London Heathrow works for tourist public transportation to airport hotels is via a series of busses which run between LHR terminals and a variety of hotels in the vicinity of the airport. The hotel list and routes sign showed 7 different bus routes for 22 different hotels. The ticket price is a set cost of 5 GBP one-way or 9 GBP round trip for any of the hotel routes.
Radisson Blu Edwardian Heathrow Airport is on the H3 route.
The problem was the H3 bus scheduled to run every 30 minutes was scheduled for 9:12pm. I arrived at the bus stop at 9:15pm. Next bus 9:42. The next H3 bus did not arrive at the scheduled departure time or even by the departure time scheduled after that at 10:12pm. Every other airport hotel bus route had been covered at least twice. There were now about 15 of us waiting for the H3 bus to Radisson Blu, Heathrow Marriott and Sheraton Skyline and we were on the verge of a bus hijacking by irate tourists. (Just hyperbolic phrasing on my part. LHR is covered with police carrying machine guns.)
Finally a driver on a different bus route agreed to take us to the H3 hotels. On the slow way out of LHR to the Radisson Blu with stalled traffic due to airport construction after 10 pm on a Tuesday evening, we passed through a tunnel and coming towards us was the Hoppa H3 route bus finally on its way to the airport, some 90 minutes since the previous run for that route.
I walked into my free room at the Radisson Blu Edwardian London Heathrow courtesy of United Airlines Customer Service at 10:47pm Tuesday night.
  
  
My flight to San Francisco was scheduled for 10:15 am Wednesday.
United Airlines customer service had also given me a 19.95 GBP dinner and 14.95 GBP breakfast voucher for the hotel restaurants.
There are three restaurants in the hotel, Steak & Lobster Restaurant is the large fine dining restaurant in the same room as the breakfast buffet. Annayu, an Indian restaurant and the Bijou Bar. Annayu Indian restaurant had the best prices, but the Bijou Bar was the only place still serving food at 11pm.
I ordered a bijou chicken dish that left me wishing I had arrived to the hotel an hour earlier for Indian restaurant dining.
Not really sure what I ordered, just that the chicken was edible and those other things were not and tasted like they were covered in Ragu sauce.
Radisson Blu Edwardian London Heathrow Lobby
The large lobby has the appearance of an upper upscale London hotel.
Breakfast Buffet
I loved the fact that the breakfast buffet was 17.50 GBP and my voucher was for 14.95 GBP. Did not matter since the hotel did not have my credit card and the waitress never took my voucher. There was a full buffet spread, service was efficient and there was the option for hot omelets made to order.
Steak & Lobster restaurant centerpiece glass art. The breakfast buffet was served in this room.
Hotel Hoppa arrived as scheduled for the morning run back to London Heathrow in plenty of time for me to hang out in the Terminal 3 Plaza Premium Lounge before my United Airlines flight home to San Francisco.
Radisson Blu Edwardian London Heathrow is a large hotel with 459 rooms spread across 4 floors.
Club Carlson category 5 reward night 44,000 points.
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