Back in Denmark now and feeling a bit knackered, possibly due to only getting 3 hours sleep in the airport last night, or the fact that I got a typhoid/hepA jab yesterday from Andrew as he sent me on my merry way. The flights over were fairly unexciting, which is the best way, though I almost missed the Ryanair flight from Prestwick as it left 25 minutes ahead of schedule - they put out a final call for me when I was still lost somewhere in the duty free.
It's always a bit bizarre sleeping in an airport, and now that it's impossible to get to Stansted before the first flights leave in the morning, more and more people are having to do it. Unless you grab a bench by about 9pm, you'll have to sleep on the floor. So I bedded down the other night, surrounded by snoring people, and slept remarkably well through all the flight announcements. By the time I awoke, however, everyone else was up and the airport was full of people in suits walking around me and looking at me like I was a homeless person lying alone on the floor. Next time I'll take a cardboard sign.
Some of the Ryanair planes are beginning to look their age. On the flight up to Scotland the guy in front of me was sitting in a broken seat that kept falling back into the reclined position and the cabin crew kept coming around to tell him to put his seat back up when we were taking off. He tried to explain to one of them that it was broken but the stewardess just replied, "Don't lean on it then!"
Just leaving to go to the airport now. Looking forward to a night in Stansted Airport!
I've just booked flights to Scotland for next week and I'm hoping to catch up with all the friends I haven't seen for over a year. My flight from London to Glasgow cost a whopping £1.99 plus tax (under £9 total) with Ryanair.
For flight info click below
4 Nov Flight GO406 Dep 2055 Arr 2150 Copenhagen - Stansted
5 Nov Flight FR407 Dep 0950 Arr 1100 Stansted - Prestwick
I got back to Denmark on Sunday, after spending Saturday night in Hamburg then catching the train up to Copenhagen.
I was given a lift ashore this morning in the Port Authority rib, which had a lovely 300hp engine, as I'd lifted our dinghy out of the water yesterday. Then, as I had plenty of time, I walked the 6km or so out to the airport.
The party for Festa de Gracias, Mahon's patron saint is in full swing right now. The air force just did an air display above the city, then made a low-level formation fly past the airport. Last night there were fireworks and festivities late into the night in the old town, and the celebrations are set to continue all weekend. I'm sorry I'll miss it.
Planned to finish packing tonight but instead drank the best part of a bottle of Berberana wine and watched a VCD of Charlies Angels I bought from some Triads on the streets of Hong Kong last year. Yesterday I went for a badly needed haircut; I simply said "Corto", but he misunderstood and assumed I was off to join the National Front, hence I now have no hair at all.
I did manage to find a new favourite cafe today, called Cafe Ars (seriously), which has lovely coffee, a good sound system (Bose - you can hear the difference), and a strange maze of passageways that seem to travel underneath all of Mahon before finally getting to the toilets. So I sat there today, and wondered what happens to British people when they go on holiday. Earlier I'd been passed by an English 70 year-old walking around town in only a bra and shorts, the kind of behaviour that would have her taken straight back to the old persons home if she was in Britain, but obviously fine to do if you're in Spain. A cruise ship was in, and the port was full of very fat people who were too big to manage to walk up the stairs into town, and had given up, deciding instead to sit on the stairs and eat ice cream.
On Saturday, I'm flying to Hamburg, en route to Denmark, so of course I now discover that this weekend is the biggest fiesta of the year in Mahon, with 4 days of partying and celebration for the Fiesta de Gracias, or Festival of Joy and Pleasure, the unmissable event of the year. Typical. Vorsprung durch technik.
I slept fairly well in Stansted the other night, though I was a bit surprised when I woke up in the morning to find a camera crew filming me.
Colin left today after spending the last four days or so here on the boat
and we had a really good time, though I think I need to sober up for a while
now. I drove him to the airport and he checked in for his Easyjet flight
behind Richard Branson, which struck us as a slightly bizarre thing for the owner of a competing airline to be doing.
Sleeping in Stansted airport to catch my flight to Palma tomorrow. Lots of people are sleeping all over the floor here tonight.
I flew back into Copenhagen yesterday after spending Thursday night in Stansted airport. The last week on the boat was very rough as the Balearics were hit by a storm, hence the lack of any updates.
As you may have guessed, I'm still in Palma, but I do plan to leave and sail on within the next few days. I've spent most of the last week taking advantage of the fact that I'm in a marina and getting some work done on the boat. When I haven't been working, and I wouldn't try to persuade you that I've been working all the time, I've been enjoying Palma's lovely cafes. It's really a luxury after being in the USA to be able to walk into almost any cafe and know that you'll get a proper coffee and not brown water. Unless of course you look American, however, in which case, aiming to please, the Spanish will give you a cup of brown water. It is for this and many other reasons, that I have therefore been trying to blend into the local community. This is not too difficult as I don't seem to fit into any of the stereotypes of tourist that seem to be in Mallorca right now.
A strange type of tourist appears to holiday here at this time of year. From my studies there seems to be three distinct types. One is families with very young children, who insist, as always, on sitting next to me, screaming into my ear, then being sick. The second are old people, who not only feel the need to wear socks with their shorts and sandals, but like knee length socks in an identical matching colour to their shorts. The idea behind this seems to be that the casual onlooker will at first assume that the man, as it tends to be men, is wearing trousers, but will then see a provocative flash of elderly knee as he walks down the street. To add to this bizarre mix, the third type look like sixty year old, retired, German porn stars. So as long as I don't wear my long socks, then maybe I can fit in.
Tomorrow morning I have to get up early to catch the coach over to Sweden, and then fly over to Britain. I'm planning to spend the next week in Bristol staying with Chris.
Tomorrow I fly to Copenhagen at 18:40 (arriving 21:30) on BA 0820.
Live arrival info from Copenhagen airport is here.
Back in civilisation. It feels great to be back in Britain and I'm currently in Bristol staying with Chris.
Getting out of the US turned out to be more interesting than I'd hoped for. Due to the increased security in Orlando airport we had to queue for an hour for the security check, during which I advised Nina to get rid of the nail files and other offensive weapons that she regularly carries around. As normally happens, however, I was the one who set off the metal detectors and was taken aside for 'special attention'. After further searching, removal of items from my pockets, and managing to convince the security officers that the smell from my shoes was not hidden explosives, but my socks, I was still setting off the alarms and a portable metal detector was put down my trousers. It was then that I dug deep into my pockets and discovered my long lost pocket knife! Unfortunately, they failed to share my happiness with this find, and went off to update my FBI records to 'suspected terrorist'.