As you know, I think sports and travel go together. Sports and travel are my two favorite things. Often times, my travels have revolved around sporting events. What destination do they love their sport more than England-London in particular? So since I am here in London for 9 days, I decided to make it a sports weekend in London.

Now a sports weekend in London could entail a variety of different sports. However, the only sport in the world I don’t like is Cricket so that was out. I love soccer (football) and I love to watch rugby (union). So naturally those were the two choices.

I have been to a lot of soccer games in London, mainly at Emirates Stadium to see my beloved Arsenal, but their game this week was cancelled due to the FA Cup. Chelsea’s game at West Ham and Manchester United’s game at Fulham was also cancelled so the only English Premier League (EPL) game Saturday in London was Queens Park Rangers (QPR) at Loftus Road.

My buddy Mike, his wife Franzi and I took the Hammersmith and City line out to Wood Lane, near BBC Studios. This is where Loftus Road Stadium is located. Queens Park Rangers are a rather obscure team in the annals of English football.

The CEO of Air Asia and the Mittal Family currently own QPR; which is one of the richest families in the world. The club was founded in 1882 and has played in 16 different grounds-the most in English Football history. They have plans to move out of Loftus Road, the smallest stadium in the EPL but it seems to be on hold for now as they are at risk of relegation into a lower division of football if they don’t improve their standing in the current table.

That aside, being at the game was a lot of fun. Loftus Road is small with a capacity of 18,000 people. That means that all seats are good seats and that we got a great view of the match versus Sunderland. It happened to be crucial for QPR to gain some points in the table to try to stay afloat in the relegation race for next year.

I am happy to report that QPR won the match 3-1 over Sunderland did so with some great goals and exciting play. I hope they continue to win and avoid relegation. They have a fun stadium and great fans. It would be a shame to see them go down again.

Next up on my sports weekend in London was a trip out to Twickenham-the home of Rugby. Twickenham is a small town about 30 minutes outside of London. You grab a train from Waterloo Station out to Twickenham for big rugby matches-and if you want to really get ready for the match grab some French Lager from Marks and Spencer as we did for the train! The match I saw was a Six Nations Rugby match between England and Italy.

Twickenham is the most famous rugby grounds in the world and I had never been so I was really keen to check it out. I went with my buddies Mike, Charlie and Robert. The game was pretty exciting but the atmosphere was even better. The stadium was sold out at some 82,000 people. The pageantry was great. From the introduction of the teams to the singing of ‘God Save the Queen’, (including an inspired version by my friend Charlie seen in the video below) it was perfectly English and a lot of fun.

As for the game, England beat Italy to move within a win of the Grand Slam (winning every match in the competition) and also the title of Six Nations Champions with a win versus Wales next weekend. I will actually be at the France versus Scotland match next weekend in Paris; which I am very excited for!

So Twickenham was a great experience and I highly recommend it. It was freezing in London this weekend but the good thing about English stadiums is that the fans are generally covered in case of bad weather so it’s generally warmer in the stands than outside the stadium.

After catching the train back to London Waterloo, we ended our sports weekend in London at the Kings Head pub in Islington to catch a little jazz and have a few pints…when in Rome…errr…London!

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