I'm going to London, UK on a business trip on the 21st of this month. I'll be there for about 4 days, with only one day (Sunday) for checking things out on my own. Is everything closed on Sunday in that part of the world? Also, I'd like some travel advice. Am I going to run into any problems if I pack a DE and blades on my checked luggage? I'm going to be staying in Dorking which is right outside of London. I'm really hoping to make it to some shave shop, even if it's only the smaller Drug Store type shops which I've read have some pretty good stuff. Does anyone here know of some good ones? Thanks!
Unfortunately, sundays most shops are usually closed I doubt you'll have any trouble with a DE and blades in the checked luggage, but if you have it in the carry on you'll probably be relieved of your items... I don't know anything about shops in Dorking, but I hope someone from the London area can check it out for you!
you can CARRY ON a DE blade through US security. Checking should be no problem stateside, but I can't speak for the UK. tsa list of prohibited items: IF you do carry on, make sure you take travel sized versions of all your expensive shave goodies. you can find the excessively limiting limits on the above website.
I don't know about Dorking, but be sure to visit the Bond Street in London. I don't know about opening hours on sundays, though, 24/7 shops are something we don't have yet (or only very limited - thank god!) here in Europe.
I flew about a year ago, and hit up the tsa guy with a few questions (they were slow) Everything is fine except for blades. They must be packed in checked luggage. With carry ons, there are limitations on the amount of liquids you can take Click Here I was totally shocked at what you can get by with on checked luggage. I remember reading somewhere that a sword was acceptable. I guess they figure if you can't get to it, and it isn't explosive it should be a problem. Something else to consider...Some of the liquid items I had in "checked luggage", didn't handle the flight all that well. I don't know if it was a temperature, or a pressure thing, but it permanently ruined a tube of De Vergulde Hand shave cream, but ingrams packed right next to it was fine. It also caused a cologne I had to seperate, while my trust bottle of aqua velva was great. Maybe I was just unlucky, but I wouldn't take any expensive stuff along.
A few years ago I was traveling internationally about every other week, most often to the London area. I didn't get to shop much, but I found DE blades difficult to find; for example, Boots at Heathrow didn't stock any. I was able to find Euro Palmolive at Tesco. You might come across Proraso canned goo, which as canned goo goes is pretty decent, although I can't remember specifically finding that in England though it's easily available in Italy and France...even at the airport shops. However, when I travel, I pretty much regard shaving as a necessity rather than a pleasure. Since you never know if your checked luggage will get there, you don't want to count on that. And since DEs can be hard to find, I often just ended up shaving with a cartridge. That said, you can find better cartridges in England than in the states. I'm thinking here of a Wilkinson Sword cartridge I picked up at Boots that wasn't half bad. Combine that with some Proraso canned goo, and you'll get a decent shave.
The TSA website specifically says "safety razors, including disposable razors" are acceptable in both checked and carry-on. I guess it's another matter to actually get them through security...
