JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – After nearly a week's worth of meetings all day, every day, the members of the Jacksonville delegation that traveled to London in conjunction with the Jaguars game against the Cowboys on Sunday now have a little downtime.
Daniel Davis, president of the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce, said business owners and CEOs who have met with the delegation have been very receptive to what they're learning about the River City.
"We are exporting what they want to import," Davis said. "So there's sorts of synergy that we can have between the two different communities."
The communities are Jacksonville and Liverpool. Davis said the similarities are striking, especially after meeting with leaders at their port earlier this week.
"From them dredging their port right now like we're trying to do in August, their downtown redevelopment, working hard to cut taxes in Liverpool and in Jacksonville," Davis said.
He said the delegation also met with port officials from South Africa on Friday, hoping to bring them to Jacksonville.
Now that the meetings are over, on Saturday night Jaguars owner Shad Khan will host a party with the Jacksonville delegation and many leaders from London aboard his new yacht in the River Thames.
Nearly everyone walking along the south bank of the Thames stopped to get a picture of Khan's new 308-foot vessel.
"Coming up and seeing something like this parked up here is out of the ordinary," said David Willis. "It brings a bit of character to the river."
"It really is amazing just to see it," another passerby said. "It sort of adds to the river actually, it adds to our trip to London because we are from the Southwest and there's nothing like that in the Bristol Rivers there."
One feature was the most striking to many.
"Did you notice that the Jaguar has the teal eyes?" News4Jax's Chris Parenteau asked one passerby.
"Yes, that shade of blue," the passerby said. "We were particularly taken aback by that."