21.06.08 – The longest day

Although I look forward to every holiday I take, I never know what to expect from it.

I was meant to take a scheduled morning flight from Geneva to Edinburgh and then meant to drive leisurely back home.
Such a thing never happened!!

21.06.08
06.30 am – The alarm blares into my ears. A rude wake up call

08.00 am – Ready for a cold breakfast.

08.30 am – Checked out of the hotel and ready to head back home

09.00 am – Checked in at the airport desk of Easy Jet. (A cheap way to fly in Europe)

10.30 am - Boarded the flight due to depart at 10.45 am

10.50 am – Still waiting to depart. The engine seems to make funny noises.

11.15 am- The pilot announces that the engine check shows an error and he needs to call the ground staff for further inquiry. In the meantime we are supposed to sit back in the aircraft till further notice.

12.15 pm – The pilot announces that the one of the engines of the aircraft has failed and we will have to go back to the terminal building till they sort out what can be done. (Thank God they realized this major problem before the flight took off!)

13.00 pm- Passengers are still wondering whether no news is good news.

13.30 pm- Food and snacks vouchers are distributed to all passengers, and we r asked to inquire again at 20.00 pm in the night for further notice. Nobody has a clue as to what went wrong but the only thing we are assured that the flight will take off and we should not leave the airport.

18.00 pm- Still frantically waiting for further notice.

18.30 pm- We are told that our flight will depart at 21.30 pm. I was reminded of Tom Hanks in the movie ‘terminal’

21.20 pm- we have still not boarded the flight. This time there is a problem with the air conditioning unit of the aircraft and our departure is delayed to 22.10 pm. There are some agitated passengers and some really cranky children around!
Also ours was one of the last flights to take off since the Geneva airport shuts down at night!!

22.15 pm- Finally..Finally…we are ready for take off!

21.06.08 ( British Standard Time)
23.30 pm- Landed safely at Edinburgh Airport. Judging by the airport staff and the number of passengers I believe that ours was one of the last flights to arrive.
( Never realized that airports shut down at night)

00.0 am- Collected the luggage, and made our way to the car park. It is raining cats and dogs in Edinburgh and I have yet to fill petrol in my car.

00.45 am – The roads are very unfamiliar, it is pitch dark and the weather is as crazy as it can be. My Sat Nav shows 175 miles back home and I was tired already!

01.45 am- Luckily I could count on my father to drive some miles for me. Thought it was best to drive back slowly than look for a Bed and Breakfast.

02.15 am- A very faint light in the sky. I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me. But I realized soon that up north in Scotland the days are even longer! The rain had stopped and I was good to drive again.

04.35 am- Reached Home. Hit the bed as soon as I saw it.

It’s purely a co-incidence that my longest day turned out to be this year’s longest day as well!

Just when I start to think everything is perfect…disaster strikes!

The irony is that two days later I took another Easy jet flight to London and back without any delays or chaos!