Getting to Venice
Venice Airport, Tuesday 14th April 2015
We have been travelling a looooooooong time, and all of it, luxuriously, and so I feel remarkably alert and spritely. We left Sydney on Monday at 3 pm and it is now around 8 pm Sydney time, so that's twenty nine hours.
We started off in the First Class Lounge of Singapore Airlines at Sydney, where we sat for 2.5 hours eating dainty bites of curries and chicken legs and salad and fruit, washed down with champagne and white wine, catching up on Face Book and emails, and the O'Briens arrived. Gary, his pleasant face wreathed in smiles and Jenny excited as we are, like kids setting off on a school camping trip.
Our 'accommodation' on board is beyond any plane flight I have ever had. We have HUGE seats, two people of our size could share one of them, with a long bench around the compartment, which all becomes part of a 'bed' when a button is pressed. I am short and was able to lie comfortably, between Gerald and I is a distance of some three feet, I cannot hear him speaking! - and a sort of sliding door which separates us if we are not travelling companions. Gerald jokes and draws it. We have champagne to drink as we take off, the attendant opens up a compartment and fluffs out a down doona and places it tenderly over me, the pillow is feathered, the champagne is unlimited, and the food is superb. Gluten free is provided, and seriously delicious, I eat a tender steak, but cannot manage the rest. I watch two movies, and I sleep easily for a couple of hours, or more. This could be the holiday! Great food, comfortable beds, excellent wines, and attentive service.
The O'Briens have not scored seating as luxurious as ours, they are a few rows further back for some reason. They come visiting at the start of the flight, but then we do not see them until we land at Singapore Airport. We trail the airport, and how beautiful it is with gardens and butterflies and playareas for kids, finding the Business Class Lounge, where we drink another glass of champagne and eat a plate of fruit, the men drink beer, and Jenny and I have a cup of tea. We are on different flights from here to Venice, and ours leaves an hour or so before theirs. After a pleasant hour, we say "Ciao Bella!" and go our separate ways, with Gerald and I arriving just in time to catch the Swiss Air Flight to Zurich, where we change for another Swiss Air flight to Venice - they are flying Turkish Air to Istanbul, and then on to Venice.
The last time I flew Swiss Air was about twenty years ago I think, from London to Sydney, and it was the WORST flight of my life. I was so disillusioned after sitting in a 'non smoking' section, which happened to have the very next row as the START of the smoking section, and was sickened with the smell of tobacco smoke - all efforts to be moved were rebuffed. Flights were delayed and cancelled, and I spent 18 hour at Zurich Airport, where they refused to provide me with accommodation or food, and the staff both on board and in the airport, were the rudest I have ever had the misfortune to meet. This flight however is different, very different. The aeroplane is a designers's dream of high tech, clean lines, with swathes of pale wooden panelling, each person has their own 'cubicle' - Gerald and I share a 'pod for two', pods for one are even more spacious And oh my, oh my! - at the press of a button, my chair massages my back, glides into a lounging position with a raised footrest and a gentle pillow, and the Greatest Gift of all, glides down into a looooong, low bed, sort of sliding one's legs under the row in front. I am in heaven, even though I only discover the elegant long armed light's switch ten minutes before we land in Zurich. I scrambled around in the dark at night trying to find enough light to put the light on, when at the mere turn of a handle, light happened ..... I watched another movie, had three cups of green tea, and slept for hours. After a trip to the loo, I notice every person in business class has their seat reclined into the 'low bed' - all except Gerald, who is sat bolt upright in his chair, for the entire flight, despite encouragement to try out the bed. Once I awoke to find his head angled alarmingly, his mouth wide open, snoring - and woke him up. He woke as he always did, a bit like Cino, with the "Me? Me? I wasn't asleep, just resting my eyes!" look on his face, as if sleeping was a guilty pastime.
We eat a very pleasant continental breakfast of ham and cheese, yogurt and fruit, and more tea. I marvel at the miracle of international flight, how we along with hundreds of others, have flown half way across the world, with the skill of the pilot and his crew, the staff taking care of our needs, whilst we scoffed and slurped and slumbered. Josh and Gerald are always embarrassed when the flight lands, and I applaud. What a feat!
We land in Zurich, and spend another pleasant hour in the Business Lounge. I even have a coffee, it smells so good, and some fruit. We amble to the departure gate, a small affair, with a bus awaiting us, and on to the last leg to Venice. Our seats were situated in different parts of the aircraft, and Gerald has been and rectified it, and now we are together, and the business class section is almost empty. Why would that be?
We have some more breakfast, oh we have eaten a lot! - of fruit and ham and cheese, and as we fly over the beautiful Swiss Alps, I take photos, it looks like a giant pavlova, absolutely perfectly baked - and we drink a glass of champagne. Why not, it is 7.30 am and we are on yet another of our Amazing Adventures!
In an hour we land at Venice, a small airport, surrounded by waterways, and it appears deserted, as we walk along a walkway lined with murals of houses along the Venetian waterways. I am stunned as at one of only 4 baggage collection carousels, our suitcases are the first and third out. Un-fucking-believably professional. We wheel out, in our practised way, we do travel well together, and in the tiny airport, Gerald practises his Gracie and Prego, and orders his first Italian coffee, it costs three Euro and twenty, about five bucks. They are lined up by the score for coffee. We sit and wait for the O'Briens, and I write this.
We are in Venice!!! Yaaay!