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Abu Dhabi: The Journey to Abu Dhabi |
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Written by Stephen Baines
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Thursday, 19 August 2004 |
As I write this we're we're some 39000 ft above the air, at a speed of 607 mp/h with an outside air temperature of -48C with 3h 55 mins to go till we get there, it's 2141 miles to go, and the tail wind is 72kmh, we're also running about 3/4 hour late. This is seriously bad news. I knew it was bad news from the minute I discovered the screen on the seat in front.
Since the last time I flew with BA they've started to install personal screens with a range of 13 channels. Channel 13 has an online map showing exactly where you are at the moment, your distance, speed, and everything else you shouldn't really know if you are a scaredy cat when it comes to traveling.
As I said, this is seriously bad news.
The day started reasonably uneventfully, I checked out of the Radisson easily, got the bus, discovered it didn't actually go to the terminal I needed, hiked to the Heathrow Express, got the mixed value currency I ordered (all 100 dhiram notes... Very useful), waited in a queue at the check-in desk that was occupied by three people but no-one seemed to be doing much. There were three people in front of me, yet it still took 3/4 hour to get to the front. One person had about 40kg of suitcase, and was struggling to get it checked in. He kept opening the bag, moving stuff around, and putting it on the scales hoping that this would take it to the magic 23kg that is your personal allowance. Surprisingly, it had little effect. He did eventually get it down to 23kg, and the man behind the counter was amazed, until he noticed the 6 carrier bags, a rucksack and another bag he was now claiming as hand-luggage.... That check-in never moved all the time I was there - for all I know, he is still there trying to move items around, putting them in helium balloons hoping that somehow this will get the weight to the place he wants.
The second till was occupied by someone going back to Abu Dhabi. They had their cases and several boxes that looked big enough to house at least one other person - they had no worries about what the scales said. They couldn't - the boxes wouldn't fit through the gate onto the belt, no matter how they jiggled everything around. That left one desk. This desk was inhabited by BAs "beautiful people", someone more worried about the state of her nails and chatting to other beautiful people who worked for BA than actually bothering with checkins.
Hence the delay.
Eventually they allowed me to checkin. The hours spent packing, repacking, standing on the scales and repacking again paid off - 20kg. 3 magic kilos short of the limit, though it did fill me with worry as to what I've left at the hotel that weighs 1kg... I'm sure I'll discover when I arrive.
Checked in I made my way to the passport control. First stage, no problem. Second stage; "you've been randomly selected for special screening, come this way, sir". And off I went for the pleasure of having to have a full body scan from every angle to find odd bits of metal and weapons located on my person. They looked at me funny. Looked at the screen again, gave me another look, looked at the screen, sighed, and then took me to the hand-luggage scanner and put all my things through the scanner. My bag, jacket, passport and boarding card went. My bag, jacket and passport came through. No boarding card. "I can't have gone missing in there; it's impossible". It has. "No it hasn't", say they. And so the pantomime goes on for 15 minutes. Finally they agree to stop the machine and look inside - sure enough my card is there, stuck to one of their own safety stickers inside the machine.
Panicked, but now ready, I make my way through. I look around duty free but don't feel like buying much. I make my way to gate 23 and sit and wait.
9am comes and goes, but still no sign of boarding. 20 past arrives, and still no boarding. I start to worry. Boarding finally commences as a free-for-all at 9:30am, just 10 minutes before we're due to fly, but come 10:20 we're still sitting on the runway waiting to take off. Eventually we do so, and so the real journey commences. Next to me is a young boy, about 10, who feels sick. He's been drinking fizzy pop for the last 3 hours and buckets of sweets, so it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to anyone, bar his mother, who seems to not understand that bumpy aircraft, pop and sweets do not make for a pleasant journey for anyone else.
I hope that the taxi is there to greet me, and it hasn't given up waiting. I hope the hotel actually has my reservation when I get there. I hope immigration is easy. But at this moment in time I'm nervous about the whole thing. This is definitely going to be an adventure; I've never been 39000ft above Iraklion before, at 611mp/h, at -48C outside, with a flight-path seemingly over Iran and Iraq. And it's now a further 5 minutes late. |
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