GNB to STN

I think I may be the world’s worst traveler. Or at least up there on the list (if such a list were to exist).

Kaitlyn and I were on a flight out of the Grenoble airport at 1:20 this afternoon. The airport is small… really small. But the airline is a deep-discount-budget-cheapo airline that doesn’t assign seats or board by zones like Southwest. So checking in super early doesn’t really make a hill of beans difference… but their website says if you dare to actually check luggage (a practice they seem to discourage at every turn) then you really should get there two hours ahead of your flight. The airport is about an hour from our house. All this means, we needed to leave here at 10:20. 10:30 at the latest.

I finally got us out the door at 10:45.. and I still needed to go to the pharmacy. When packing the last few things this morning, I realized I had only one migraine pill left. I’m not going to get to another country and be out of a prescription that makes the difference between having to spend the day lying in the dark with a cloth on my head, or going out and having fun. Naturally, the pharmacy was packed. The whole world had to go in there this morning. Ok, maybe not the whole world. But there were four people ahead of me. So we finally got that done and were on the road to the airport at 11. Only thirty minutes late.

At first, my GPS couldn’t find me. And I have only a vague idea how to get to the airport without it. So I panicked a little bit. If it’s possible to panic only a little bit. Then it finally found me and I started to worry that somehow, it was sending me to the wrong airport. So I panicked a little bit more. It sent me to the right place and we got there just before noon. There was only a short line to check in and no line at all for security. So I guess all that panicking was for nothing.

Flying on Ryan Air was an experience. It was like a flying subway. The bulkheads were adorned with stickers for Bullseye Liquors… buy one get one free. How bad do they anticipate their flights being that they think you’ll need to liquor up? They also went around after selling us our tiny sodas offering to sell us lottery tickets… giving us hope that one day we’d have enough money not to have to fly Ryan Air. When the plane landed at Stanstead Airport in London, they played a recording of a trumpet blaring the tune you hear at the beginning of races, an announcement that you’re on yet another on-time flight, and then cheering.

I’d bought rail passes so that we didn’t have to mess around buying tickets each day. That meant we could just get right on our train. After stopping at the ticket window to have the passes validated. The train started out not too crowded. Although you’d expect a train coming from an airport to have more space for luggage. A man helped me to stuff our big duffel bag onto the overhead rack. We put the other suitcase under our little table, and sat back to take in some English countryside. The train was not an express and it stopped frequently, filling up more and more at each stop. Eventually, the train was full enough that someone had to sit with us. An older man helped shove the suitcase out of his way and sat down across from us. He took a postcard of a train out of his briefcase and slid it across the table to Kaitlyn. Now, I really didn’t know what to make of it. Other than it seemed odd. Kaitlyn didn’t know what to do, either. Finally the man asked her if she recognized the picture. Well, yes, it’s a train. She’s a kid, not an idiot.

After a while, the trolley rolled through our car, offering drinks and snacks. I hadn’t rushed past an ATM in the airport or train station, so I had not a single pence on me. Naturally, the trolley stopped at our table, while the woman pushing it chatted with the postcard man. They chatted for a good ten minutes…. all the which I tried to explain to Kaitlyn that I had no cash with which to buy food. Finally the woman shoved on to the next train car. That was when the postcard man explained that he is the railway chaplain… and part of his job is riding the trains talking with the employees. He spent the rest of our ride talking about the passing countryside, explaining how some of it is below sea level and that’s why it’s flooded, etc. Interesting. But after a while, I just wanted him to stop talking.

He got off with us at Peterbourough. I don’t know if it was where he wanted to get off, or if he only got off to be helpful. He dragged our suitcases for us off the train and through the station to the taxi stand, where he got us into a taxi and on our way. Still with no cash. Turns out, there’s an ATM pretty much across the street from the hotel. There’s also a mall. That’s where Kaitlyn and I went wandering while waiting for Bill to come home from work. Shopping with Kaitlyn isn’t a lot of fun because you only get to shop for her. I tried to look at some shoes but she just kept telling me I don’t need any. She must hear that a lot from me. Although unlike her, I relented and gave up the shoe search.

I finally just dragged her back to the hotel to rest and wait for Bill. Certainly there’d be some cartoons on tv. No. Lots of cricket, news and boring game shows. I should have just gone back to the shoe store….

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