Eugh. Early Start – nobody likes those do they? Our flight was at 9:30am so we had to leave early. Fortunately, our Bed and Breakfast did a “Bag breakfast” which was very handy for this day! We got up at 6am and left at 7am – our host had called us a taxi! When we arrived, we managed to do the self-check in thing again – but we noticed our seats weren’t together on EITHER flight! How do you book two seats on a flight at the same time and not get them next to each other?! Well in any case, it was easily rectified on the self-check in kiosk for BOTH flights.
We got to the departure lounge and we discovered our flight had been delayed by half an hour. Luckily we had a 90 minute space on Toronto for our plane to England....now it was an hour.
8:03am London
Phew! What a journey. To be honest the only things I was concerned about were my photos and our luggage – again. But we have both. Plus, I have to say that coming home was far less stressful than leaving the country. Everyone was so friendly to us as we left the country....! Surely these people on this side should have words with those who speak to customers who are leaving England. The latter should
learn to smile, at least!Anyway, the flight from Vancouver to Toronto was delayed, but the plane made up for time lost in flight...but we still disembarked with just an hour’s wait instead of 90 minutes. Good job we weren’t going to Montreal – there were lots of people on that connecting flight and Montreal seemed to be the most popular! We also noticed someone who I suspected was - and therefore I temporarily named - a Rock Star dude. He had really long dark hair, a goatee beard, and he was wearing a cream linen shirt and trousers with leapordprint shoes (!). I thought he played the guiter because I saw long fingernails on one hand and short nails on the other. After having a look at some of the people stopping to talk to him, I noticed something which I later looked up on the internet - he WAS a Rock Star dude! He was a gutarist for a Canadian band called "The Tragically Hip". And he wasn't in first class - he was in economy with the
rest of us!Anyway, I have gone off on a tangent. We had 45 minutes to get our connection by the time we had got off the plane. I was felling quite nauseous after only having eaten a (most DELICIOUS!) breakfast bagel with cream cheese and jam. And the reason for the nausea? The descent to Toronto. MAN it was rough. And I mean ROUGH. I thought I had experienced “rough” on an internal flight in America from Minneapolis to Rapid City. But seriously – that was a breeze compared to this one. The flight had a little turbulence throughout the journey, but not too bad. But we went through a very BIG part of some seriously BIG A$$ rainclouds and it actually felt like we were falling, not flying. I was glad to have my belt on, otherwise I would have not been in my seat when we came out the other side of the cloud. Imagine a roller coaster with lots of unknown twists and turns, VERY fast.....now imagine you HATE roller coasters....that’s pretty close to this plane descending into Toronto Airport. I think the Captain just looked at the cloud and said “Sod it!” and nose-dived as fast as possible. It was terrible!!!
So, by the time we had found our seats on the plane to London England, I had bought a LARGE packet of crisps and a bottle of water, and my stomach was stable, contents inside. I was hoping we wouldn’t be going through quite so much turbulence on the way up, but then again it was an International flight and a much larger plane. On the descent into London Heathrow, I think the Captain may have circled the rainclouds and waited for a gap to get through. That was fine though!
The flight to London wasn’t too exciting, although we did sit next to a very nice lady who had travelled from Auckland via Sidney, Vancouver and Toronto all the way to London in one go!! How she did it, I do not know! We tried to sleep on the plane, but I think we knew that wasn’t going to work. We tried and failed, and soon we were eating “breakfast” at 5:30am UK time (!!!!!)
As THIS plane was also late, we were now thinking of our National Express coach which left at 7:30am. We were supposed to land at 6:30am but we landed at 6:47am. We got to baggage claim by 7:05am and had all our bags by 7:25am.
We had 5 minutes.
And I cannot believe how LONG the walk was to the coach!! It was SUCH a long long way, and we actually got on the bus at 7:33am....but I think they may have been waiting for us because we had pre-booked our seats on that coach. Still, I hate rushing...but in this case I did not mind at all! We left London Heathrow for Leicester on the National Express with everything we left Vancouver with. Now we just had to endure a 3 hour coach trip with no air conditioning.
We finally reached home, Markfield, where long LONG showers were taken and enjoyed, and hair was washed, and clean fresh clothes were worn. We felt like zombies.
I had never had any trouble with jetlag before, but it took me the next week to get over it – for some reason my body wanted to sleep when my mind didn’t want to, and vice-versa. Needless to say, I felt quite rough over the weekend! But after a week, I was feeling much better and fully recovered.
So.....the question remains......would I do this much travelling ever again?
Seriously?
OHH YESSSS!!
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