Sunday - 4th September 2011
After months of planning, and past few weeks of counting down the sleeps, THE day is finally here - surreal!
With a happy smiley face our cat/housesitter arrives punctually at designated time, and gets busy playing with (distracting) the cats, while we finish packing and trying to remember any last minute instructions/emergency numbers ... 4pm and we're off down the street on a short walk to the local bus stop for the airport shuttle - we'd need not have hurried as much, it was running late, and enroute, we get to see parts of inner Melb not seen before, as passengers various were collected - all part of the adventure! :o)
Luggage checked in, boarding passes in hand, we head for the International departure lounge, and fooood!
Not long after finishing our meals, three chirpy elder English ladies sit at the next table, one with a decidedly ratbag twinkle in her eye - it's not long before we five get chatting. They'd ordered a tapas platter to share between them, saying lunch (at a retirement home, where they'd been visiting a friend) was a long time ago. "It was quite nice really" says Ratbag, "... at least we didn't have to chew it!" ;o)
I can't help but ask her, did she always get into 'trouble' at school with the teachers? Oooh yes, she says proudly and as a result, became a teacher herself, and all the ratbag kids she taught loved her! Would have liked to hear more of her stories, but the trio had a 9pm plane to catch ... the tapas platter gets shoved our way to share, still two thirds full with a plea of please help them finish it, and won't hear our 'protest' ... minutes later, they were gone
Finally, it's our turn to face the longest leg of the trip: 14 hours non-stop, to Abu Dhabi! Six movies later (dozed through most of No.4 I think - must have been good!) and we're almost there! We'd departed Melbourne at night, flown hours in total darkness, got to see some of the lights of Colombo from up on high, watched the approaching dawn of a new day following us to Abu Dhabi ... about an hour out from landing, the sun popped it's bright orange ball over the 'horizon' of hazy cloud and across the sand of UAE - special! Sadly, did not have the camera handy :o(
Flawless landing - 6am in Abu Dhabi, it's already 30 degrees celcius!
AD airport ... it's huge, very busy, have recliner chairs to put your feet up while you wait for the next flight, and is somewhat amusing:
- their loos have sensors that automatically flush it within a few secs of you standing up ... just don't lean forward if you're still seated - as Chris did! ;o)
- Melb flight staff are so organised with getting passengers boarded and seated in an orderly efficient fashion ... at AD? it's every man/woman for themselves! Fortuitously, we'd somehow managed to be a few of the first to board our flight for the next leg to Brussels and get smartly to our seats, to then watch the chaos of others doing 'musical chairs' with finding theirs - it seems that reading seat numbers is optional! Flight attendants? What flight attendants? They had no control ;o)
TBC ...
