Sydney to London
Yes, we flew Malaysia Airlines, and yes, that contributed to the pre-flight tension in its own magical way. As did all those people who expressed horror or deep sympathy when we told them of this fact. Special thanks to them. In the end we found ourselves turning to fairly tasteless humour to ease this tension. We found ourselves telling people we'd brought the booking upgrade where we didn't get shot at by rebel forces. Told you it was tasteless but it helped.
What certainly didn't help was our online check-in experience. We were staying at Michelle's place the night before the flight and we decided to check-in online. We got out the mobile phone and the tablet but we got a rude shock. The online booking system told us that no flight existed the next day to book in on. Now, just a day or do earlier the Malaysian government had to financially bail out Malaysian Airlines so it was quite feasible that they'd cancelled flights. Here we were at 11pm facing the prospect of having tickets on a flight that didn't exist. Boy did we chuckle about that. Michelle decided she'd ring the help line and with persistence got through. It turns out, amusingly, that if you're using smart devices you have yo use their special app and can only making one booking per device. It would have made the booking experience a little less bowel-loosening if they'd had a simple message saying this as opposed to denying your flight existed.
Only two other observations on the flight over. First, travelling with a small child is probably hell - getting to share that experience is not much better. Especially when there seemed to be 4 or 5 in our section of the plane - all happy to cry their damp bums off. One in particular must have gone to the Nursery of Demonic Possession and passed with honours in aggravating crying. Try that for 14 hours and see how hard it is not to give in to inappropriate idle thoughts in relation to child survival.
And the other observation is more of a question - if it's not right to allow smoking on planes (fair enough) how is it right to allow people with malodorous flatulence to get away with it. Surely, at least they should wear some kind of warning badge.
Anyway, we landed safe and sound - and the real adventure began.
It was bright and early and we were in London meeting our son, Michael, by 7 am that morning. Needless to say it was fantastic. We were booked in a hotel close to the city centre and after we dropped our bags off we began a long and wonderful day. We breakfasted at the Tower of London, walked up to St Paul's, caught a bus to Trafalgar Square, checked out Westminster Abbey, walked down to Big Ben and The a Houses of Parliament and finally staggered home some hours later. Then it was out for some pints at the local where we met up with our other son, Tim, and nephews Tom and a Jake and Michael's friend, Becky. Then off for dinner on the South Bank. A huge day all round - and the location of our hotel was just perfect. Right in the heart, surrounded by amazing old buildings. Who says you need to relax on holidays? (Kate seems to think we do - weird hey?)
Yes, we flew Malaysia Airlines, and yes, that contributed to the pre-flight tension in its own magical way. As did all those people who expressed horror or deep sympathy when we told them of this fact. Special thanks to them. In the end we found ourselves turning to fairly tasteless humour to ease this tension. We found ourselves telling people we'd brought the booking upgrade where we didn't get shot at by rebel forces. Told you it was tasteless but it helped.
What certainly didn't help was our online check-in experience. We were staying at Michelle's place the night before the flight and we decided to check-in online. We got out the mobile phone and the tablet but we got a rude shock. The online booking system told us that no flight existed the next day to book in on. Now, just a day or do earlier the Malaysian government had to financially bail out Malaysian Airlines so it was quite feasible that they'd cancelled flights. Here we were at 11pm facing the prospect of having tickets on a flight that didn't exist. Boy did we chuckle about that. Michelle decided she'd ring the help line and with persistence got through. It turns out, amusingly, that if you're using smart devices you have yo use their special app and can only making one booking per device. It would have made the booking experience a little less bowel-loosening if they'd had a simple message saying this as opposed to denying your flight existed.
Only two other observations on the flight over. First, travelling with a small child is probably hell - getting to share that experience is not much better. Especially when there seemed to be 4 or 5 in our section of the plane - all happy to cry their damp bums off. One in particular must have gone to the Nursery of Demonic Possession and passed with honours in aggravating crying. Try that for 14 hours and see how hard it is not to give in to inappropriate idle thoughts in relation to child survival.
And the other observation is more of a question - if it's not right to allow smoking on planes (fair enough) how is it right to allow people with malodorous flatulence to get away with it. Surely, at least they should wear some kind of warning badge.
Anyway, we landed safe and sound - and the real adventure began.
It was bright and early and we were in London meeting our son, Michael, by 7 am that morning. Needless to say it was fantastic. We were booked in a hotel close to the city centre and after we dropped our bags off we began a long and wonderful day. We breakfasted at the Tower of London, walked up to St Paul's, caught a bus to Trafalgar Square, checked out Westminster Abbey, walked down to Big Ben and The a Houses of Parliament and finally staggered home some hours later. Then it was out for some pints at the local where we met up with our other son, Tim, and nephews Tom and a Jake and Michael's friend, Becky. Then off for dinner on the South Bank. A huge day all round - and the location of our hotel was just perfect. Right in the heart, surrounded by amazing old buildings. Who says you need to relax on holidays? (Kate seems to think we do - weird hey?)
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