Today we fly to civilisation of London. The flight was at 7.45am from Delhi airport so we had to get up at 3.15am. The car we organised to take us arrived at 4am. We packed up and were ready when we jumped in the lift. While in the life it broke! We were stuck in the hotel lift for about 10min. we tried all the buttons and nothing would happen. Even the alarm button was ornamental. It wasn’t until we tried to open the lift doors manually that we discovered that we had not moved at all. So out we jumped and wisely used the steps. Once we got to the lobby we told the guy at reception that the lift was broken and we were stuck, his only response was how are you going to pay the bill. No apology, no I’m sorry ill look into that, just a blank face. I think he didn’t really understand a lot of English so didn’t comprehend what happened.
Out the hotel we went into the car to the airport. It was raining so the car dropped Alex home. He only lived 5min down the road so it was no big deal. Off to the airport we went. Once there, we checked onto out flight. There was a problem with our e-tickets so checking in too 10min and we didn’t get our second leg of our trip boarding pass.
After that we had to deal with security. There were no signs up saying you had to take out your laptops and put them through separately to your bags. So just put everything though together. Through the metal detectors you go. I didn’t beep but I still had to have a pat down behind a separate curtain. The lady standing in there spent more time standing round saying she was tired then doing anything. Once that was over the x-ray scanners wanted me to pull apart my bag to take out my laptop. They were not clear on what they wanted, you would ask them a yes or no question and all you get is a head wobble in response that you can’t tell if it is a yes or no. Once the lap top was pulled out they scanned everything again and found a tiny pair of scissors that I didn’t even know that was there. The funny thing is no other airport in this journey had picked them up.
Next was immigration. This part was painful. You have to fill out forms to exit the country like you do for most countries. On this form was where you stayed. Alex had booked and organised our hotel in Delhi so we only knew the name of the hotel not the area. The immigration guy wanted to know the area, he was adamant about it. We didn’t know and I had packed the bill from the hotel in my luggage that was on the plane. In the end he let us through but only just. If I judged India based on this airport I would hate it and be leaving as soon as possible.
Once though all that it was just a matter of killing about an hour till our flight. I checked the status of our flight and it said nothing. Later on as we were about the head to the gate the status said gate closed. We looked at each other and bolted. We couldn’t work out how it was closed when our boarding time wasn’t for another 5 mins. We got to the gate and they hadn’t started loading yet, so I don’t know what the screens were on about. On the plane we got and took off for Muscat in Oman.
The flight was uneventful. It was a smaller plane so no individual screens only common ones that were playing some Bollywood movie about a cricketer. I sat down in my seat and fell asleep for most of the flight. The flight managed to take less time so it was only 2 hours.
We arrived at Muscat airport at about 10am. Our flight to London wasn’t till 2pm so we had time to kill. The first thing we had to do was get our boarding passes for Muscat to London. This was a very long process. We had to stand in lines in front of windows to be issued with our next boarding pass. The lines were about 15 people in front of us and moving at about 1 person every 10ish min. while Kyle was in the bathroom one guy came up to me and said if you have your boarding pass you can just go straight on threw, in reply I said we didn’t and that’s why we were lining up. He gave me a not so optimistic look and said good luck. That was going to be a good omen. Not long after that the line I was standing in window decided to close so I then had to join another que. Oh what joy! A little bit later they opened another window for people who need to be on a plane very soon. That que went quickly so Kyle and I joined that one and we got our boarding passes in record time for Muscat airport.
Into the international terminal we went. We both were thirsty so had a look around and decided to have a sit in an irish pub. When we walked in we were the only one there apart from staff. The staffs informed us that they were only serving tea and coffee at the moment and if that wasn’t a problem please take a seat. Kyle ordered tea and I ordered water. Only the water arrived for some reason. When we got up to ask about it the staff magically disappeared and we couldn’t find them to ask. We sat around the pub for about an hour on our computers typing away. We then decided we were hungry so we left the pub and went to find food. The only thing that looked appetizing was a dairy queen that was a chill and grill. So it was a glorified burger place. The food wasn’t bad but what do you expect from a fast food burger place. We sat around there for about another hour or so and went off to see what the airport was about. Kyle found 2 free English newspapers so sat down on a bench to read. I found a book store that sold Australian Woman’s Weekly Cookbooks. It was a whole stand of them not just one or 2. I didn’t know they were popular outside of Australia or that people had even heard of them. While there I tried to buy a stamp for a post card so I can prove I had been there but no one in the airport sold stamps or even a place to send them. That was a bit disappointing.
It was time to board our flight. The boarding pass said to start boarding at 1.30pm so we got to the gate at 1.25pm to only find we were the last one to get on the plane. They had changed the boarding time without telling anyone. But oh well we got on the plane and headed to London.
The flight was again uneventful. It was about 8 hours on a nice plane with your own TV and alike. I watched Singing in the rain, Chitty Chitty bang bang, gentlemen prefer blonds and only because we had been to India Slum dog Millionaire. While on the flight they served us ice cream and a chocolate chip cookie as a light in between meal snack. That was nice and good. Other than that the food was normal plane food.
Off the flight we got. We landed about 7pm London time and headed for immigration. 2 planes happened to land about the same time but we were first so we took a brisk walk not to be stuck behind 2 plane loads of people to immigration. At the start of the wiggly que rope off area there was a group of Japanese tourist so we jumped in front of them otherwise it was going to take forever. The lady that served us was quite nice and didn’t ask any question about our visa or anything. I was kind of worried that they were going to want to see bank statement again to prove we had the funds to support our selves. So through immigration and onto bag collection. Our bags arrived safely! I was telling Kyle from the start of the trip that Heathrow was going to eat our bags and not get them back for a few days.
With bags in tow we headed for the Heathrow express. It was very easy to find and well sign posted. We bought tickets easily and sat on the platform for 15min waiting for the train. Once on board it was only 15min to Paddington station. It was much quicker than I thought it was going to be. Once at Paddington Kyle and I decided to jump in a cab because it wasn’t going to be very far and we didn’t want to negotiate the underground tired and loaded down.
We got in our very first black cab! He was a very nice driver and he took us to the relatives I have in London. He had to look up the address because he wasn’t quite sure where it was. That’s ok he got us there in no time and it only cost us 12 pound or something like that.
Out we jump at Trish and Michaels to find dinner waiting and a nice warm bed. From the time we landed to the time we waked in the door of their place it was only 1.5 hours. Much better than it thought it was going to be.
After dinner and a chat we were quite tried so we headed off to bed for a good night sleep to hopefully to kill jet lag.
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