We were up before 6am. We were leaving the Belgravia B+B at
6am. It took us about 2 hours to get to Heathrow. We took an Underground train
from Victoria to Hammersmith and then just walked across the platform to the
Piccadilly Line to Heathrow’s Terminal 3. That way we only had stairs to carry
luggage down at Victoria. It is amazing the number of Tube stops without elevators or
escalators. They don’t advertise that fact either.
We were through security and bags checked etc. within 15
minutes. It was faster than RDU and much faster than Edinburgh. We had
breakfast at Bridge Restaurant past security. We did some duty free shopping
and waited for our gate to be announced at 9:40am. It was closer to 9:50am
before they posted Gate 30 which was about as far away as you could get. We
used the restrooms one last time.
When you get to the gate, you go through another security
check and then you are held in an area without restrooms or other amenities,
although there was a Coke machine and a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream dispensing
machine. Go figure.
Now we are flying home to RDU. The 767 seems pretty full.
Our little extra room section is filled up. It is nice. It is 3 rows of 2 3 2.
We are in the last row of 2 so we have plenty of room. We have the
stewardesses’ luggage behind us and a coat rack of hangars.
They are going to serve lunch and show the movies Parental
Guidance and Amazing SpiderMan. We had seen the SpiderMan movie. They woke me
up to serve pizza and I watched the end of it. I had a lunch of pasta about 3
hours earlier. This flight is about an hour longer than the overnight flight
which seemed to go by much quicker. I guess it is a combination of the earth rotating,
jet stream and daylight hours.Take off and flight so far all smooth. We took off into a
cloud, so no views like when we arrived for our aerial tour of London over the
River Thames.
It was hot and humid when we landed in Raleigh. It took us
over an hour to claim luggage and clear all the CBP screens and checkpoints.
This meant we had almost an hour to kill getting $2 in bills for the bus fare
for one of us and using the restrooms and waiting for the 3:41pm TTA bus to Raleigh. There was a wreck on I-40 with a lane closure and it was thunderstorming in Raleigh. It stopped just before we got off the bus at Moore Square
Station, so we walked home together with our luggage. I must have looked too
pooped because Clay took my luggage from me at about the halfway point and
pulled both our rolling duffels most of the rest of the way home. I did about
the last block. Our irises were in bloom when we got home and the grass was
very tall. The pond wasn’t running. It turned out there was no electricity in
our bathroom either and the circuit breaker that controlled both had switched
off. No idea why. But, it flipped right back on so everything was fine at home
while we were gone.
We got home about 5pm, unpacked and went to bed by 8pm. It
was good to be back in our own bed, in our own room, in our own house, in our
own town, in our own country. It was a hard trip for me. I felt taxed to the limit and overstressed too much of the time for too many days running. We’d both have liked it much
better with better weather, but the weather is the weather everywhere and you
don’t know what you’ll get. We’re glad to have done it and seen all we’ve seen,
but it is good to be home.
