The Last Leg is the Longest

I hope you like my alliterative axiom? I have now done four long flights. The first was OK, and I managed to doze for a couple of hours. I watched several movies, one of which was the latest Twilight episode (don't judge me!). I was disproportionately disconcerted by the fact that the 50-something man next to me also watched this. Surely he is the wrong demographic?! The second flight was Turbulence City. The third was utterly unmemorable, except that when I got off the plane, I couldn't find my boarding pass. I had to sit on the Bench of Shame while they took my passport and went off to get me a new boarding pass. Before they returned, I had found the original one myself, so then they had to cancel the replacement one and retrieve my passport.

The last flight was the worst. It always seems on the last leg of a trip that time slows to a crawl, but it was really noticeable on this 11-hour grueling test of endurance. A toddler sat behind me. She cried a fair bit, but not all the time - at other times she played, talked, ate and slept. However, no matter what the child was doing, the mother had her ceiling light on ALL the time. It was like trying to sleep outside under a blazing sun. No sleep for me.

The girl across the aisle from me had three seats to herself, so she promptly lay down and went to sleep (she LAY DOWN! I would have killed to lie down by this point). I could not decide if I hated her or the guy behind her more. He also had 3 seats, but stayed upright for the entire trip. The waste!

Also, it appeared I had been mistakenly seated in the middle of the Olympic Farting Team. Either that, or it was all the work of one very dedicated individual. Periodically, a breeze blew through the plane and I could briefly breathe until the dark miasma descended once more. For a while, I suspected the perp was the guy seated in front of me. However, there was another attack while he was up out of his seat. So unless he was a ventriloquist farter, or he'd detonated a slow-release bomb before he got up, he was in the clear. Unlike me. I arrived at Auckland broken in mind, body and nasal passages.

The flight landed 45 mins early and I breezed through customs to find the family waiting. Now back home, grimly wading through the 2820 photographs. I only hope I can find 10 good ones...

Last day

Farewell London! Spent my last day at the National Gallery and wandering around the city.

Then I came home and tried to fit all my crap into my suitcase. I now have a suitcase, backpack and a spare handbag K lent me. The suitcase weighs in at 20.3kg. I wonder what that costs in excess baggage? Can only hope Heathrow's scales are less sensitive than bathroom scales.....

Harry Potter

Monday - off we went to the new Harry Potter studio tour. Due to this attraction only opening on March 31st, tickets were not easy to come by. We found some tickets through a coach company, so that took care of the travel too!

On the way out, the tour guide chatted about all the sights we were passing. Alas, it was raining and the coach was full so all the windows steamed up. "Off to your right, you will see Buckingham Palace," he raved, and we all stared at the condensation-logged window. "To your left, Hyde Park!" and we all stared at the condensation on the other side.

Anyway, eventually we arrived, because the Easter Monday traffic was light (finally, an upside to the petrol crisis!). We had a civilised lunch, and then went in for our tour. We saw film sets like the Great Hall, and props like the knitting that knits itself. There was lots to see and LOTS of people there to see it! I pretended to be Harry Potter (though I baulked at putting a lightning scar on my face), my brother-in-law R was Ron (he has the right hair colour!), and my sister K was Hermione (me: don't straighten your hair! You need to be wearing bushy hair and a slightly anxious expression. K: one leads to the other...)

We had a nice time, and then came home to Ben&Jerry's icecream. A lovely day!

Arundel

Today, Arundel castle. It is a lovely Disney-fied castle, and I wouldn't put money on how authentic it might be, but it makes for great photos!

The weather remains bright and clear and sunny; not terribly warm, perhaps, but no worse than NZ in the spring.

I braved the 131 steps to the castle keep and took lots of photos.

Then we wandered around the town. I was nervous that shops might be shut as it is Good Friday, but fortunately some were still open, including one fabulous bookshop. Succumbed to a few more books. Suitcase is going to be horribly heavy!

On the way back to the train station, we passed a field in which rabbits were gambolling. They must have been Easter bunnies, out hiding chocolate eggs...

No snow

Thank you, everyone, for your concern (if that is, in fact, what your comments amount to), but let me reassure you that we do NOT have snow here. Not in Brighton, at any rate.

I'm not saying I will be frolicking on the beach in a bikini, but the sun is out and I'll certainly be strolling along the beach, albeit with my jacket on.

In other news, I am reading a hilarious book called How Not To Write A Novel. It tells you all the things aspiring novelists do wrong, and I am greatly enjoying it. I fear my sister is not; I keep laughing madly and then reading bits out to her - which wouldn't be so bad except that I have borrowed the book from my brother-in-law, who has also been reading it, laughing madly, and then reading bits out to my sister. She is looking very long-suffering. I may have to buy a copy.

Easter approaches, and while the Cadbury's here is inferior, Hotel Chocolat more than compensates...

Fun all year on Brighton Pier

Today we went out in the sun and played tourists on Brighton Pier. We ate candyfloss, and ice-cream, and looked at the hardened gamblers already losing money to the pokies at 11am.

But the best bit was that my nephew kindly took me on the carousel. I love carousels, and would have endured the shame of being a middle-aged woman riding on her own, but luckily I didn't have to. We shared a double-seater horse, whose name was Kelly. Postcard-like photos courtesy of my sister.

Finished up the day with another visit to Hotel Chocolat. I wonder if chocolate would survive the plane ride home?

Tea time

Today I got to pretend I was a Lady Traveller from the 19th century, when I took tea with the brother and sister-in-law of my colleague John.

Arriving in a strange city, armed with a letter of introduction, I could have been a character from Jane Austen! (Ok, the letter was figurative - but Email of Introduction sounds wrong)

I put on my Going Out For Tea clothes (including my new skirt, bought under the aegis of my sister Sarah, who claims all my clothes are boring; she made me buy a skirt with an odd pattern on it because it was "interesting"), and had a nice slow wander through the streets of Brighton.

Tea was lovely, with cut sandwiches, and muffins. It was nice to have a grown-up conversation that was not interrupted every two minutes by my nephew wanting me to go and play Cars with him (he is Finn McMissile and I am Lightning McQueen).

I'm sure I stayed longer than politeness demanded, but eventually I tore myself away and strolled home again. In retrospect, I should not have worn my new sandals, as I have ended up with three blisters. But it was worth it to have a nice afternoon out! Besides, my buttoned boots were at the cleaners, along with my bonnet and pelisse.