Day 22 - England "Here we go, here we go, here we go...."
Streets of Battersea
Day 22 was a particularly long day for 2 reasons: 1) we caught the shuttle bus at 4.00am to get to the airport; and 2) we lost 5 hours on the way to England.
I could not believe my ears when booking the shuttle bus when they said the pick up time was 4.05am. Our flight was not until 8.40am however as there were more commuters to be picked up and we were first cab off the rank it was an early start. As we did not get home from dinner and Times Square until midnight, then we debated the purpose of actually going to sleep. I think Talia crashed at 1.00am, Zac at 2.00am, Jacqui at 2.45am and I dozed on and off for an hour or so before waking again at 3.30am.
One thing we quickly learned and would suggest this for anyone who is travelling overseas: pay the extra couple of dollars and hire a driver for the trips to and from the airport. Basically it took us 2 hours to get from the Hotel to the airport whereas with a driver it would have taken 30 minutes. By the time we picked up all passengers the shuttle contained 10 people, 15 suitcases, a Tuba and a pram and was chockers. To add to the pain, the shuttle had left it's suspension in the workshop and with the New York roads being appalling, by the time we arrived at the airport we all needed organ reassignment surgery to put the organs back into the positions they started.
The check-in process was quite simple and getting onto the flight was good however whilst on the flight the entertainment system in our row was not working so we did not have any access to the in-flight movies or music. Luckily we had our iPhones and iPods to keep us entertained as well as catching a bit more sleep.
We arrived 30 minutes early due to a strong tail wind and found the security and customs process in Heathrow airport to be extremely simple. After filling in our landing cards and showing passports we then exited through the nothing to declare doors and were out in the airport where our driver was waiting. We were then entertained on the 30 minute journey to Battersea by hearing the life story of our Sri Lankan driver.
It is fair to say that we were extremely pleased to arrive at the Dawes residence, put the bags away and enjoy a very nice cuppa coffee and piece of banana cake. It was great to finally catch up with Nikla and Stephen again and we are looking forward to spending plenty of time with them over the next 10 days.
I could not believe my ears when booking the shuttle bus when they said the pick up time was 4.05am. Our flight was not until 8.40am however as there were more commuters to be picked up and we were first cab off the rank it was an early start. As we did not get home from dinner and Times Square until midnight, then we debated the purpose of actually going to sleep. I think Talia crashed at 1.00am, Zac at 2.00am, Jacqui at 2.45am and I dozed on and off for an hour or so before waking again at 3.30am.
One thing we quickly learned and would suggest this for anyone who is travelling overseas: pay the extra couple of dollars and hire a driver for the trips to and from the airport. Basically it took us 2 hours to get from the Hotel to the airport whereas with a driver it would have taken 30 minutes. By the time we picked up all passengers the shuttle contained 10 people, 15 suitcases, a Tuba and a pram and was chockers. To add to the pain, the shuttle had left it's suspension in the workshop and with the New York roads being appalling, by the time we arrived at the airport we all needed organ reassignment surgery to put the organs back into the positions they started.
The check-in process was quite simple and getting onto the flight was good however whilst on the flight the entertainment system in our row was not working so we did not have any access to the in-flight movies or music. Luckily we had our iPhones and iPods to keep us entertained as well as catching a bit more sleep.
We arrived 30 minutes early due to a strong tail wind and found the security and customs process in Heathrow airport to be extremely simple. After filling in our landing cards and showing passports we then exited through the nothing to declare doors and were out in the airport where our driver was waiting. We were then entertained on the 30 minute journey to Battersea by hearing the life story of our Sri Lankan driver.
It is fair to say that we were extremely pleased to arrive at the Dawes residence, put the bags away and enjoy a very nice cuppa coffee and piece of banana cake. It was great to finally catch up with Nikla and Stephen again and we are looking forward to spending plenty of time with them over the next 10 days.
