Today was our last day in Vancouver before we moved on.
A late start, because we overslept, packed up the suitcases followed by a walk back down to Gastown to purchase some Canadian souvenirs.
There was another liner in today, Coral Princess, and as a consequence Gastown was abuzz & the souvenir shops were doing a very good trade, a trade we added to!
Back to the apartment to uplift our cases and we humped then to the Yaletown Roundhouse Skytrain station stopping on the way for lunch.
The train arrived almost as soon as we got to the platform and we had a rather interesting trip to YVR airport - interesting because as we travelled we were approached by a man who asked, in a rather Scottish accent, whether we had heard the news?
What news? The Queen has abdicated in favour of Prince William & she'll be known as the Kings Grandmother rather than the Queen Mother.
It didn't stop there - Catherine is a Jew! Camilla has a drinking problem! I trained horses for the Queen! ...... After a while he moved away as he could tell that we had no interest in his stories and he stopped further down the train beside a lady - have you heard the news I heard him say again and off he went on his story telling.
Before long we arrived at the airport, checked in and relaxed waiting for our Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt.
We had been allocated seats in row 57 but when they called boarding they announced boarding for rows 46-56 which had us wondering whether we were sitting outside on a tail wing or similar but there was in fact a row 58 as well!
The plane was a Boeing 747 which had been recently refurbished with a touch screen system and a very realistic flight information program.
It soon became apparent that even though Lufthansa is a Star Alliance partner as is Air New Zealand the service was infinitely superior to Air New Zealand's - a snack & drinks shortly after reaching cruising altitude and then the hot towel before meal service, metal cutlery, tastier food all absent on our earlier flight.
The flight left around 45 mins late and travelled what I would describe as the Artic Circle route up over Greenland - there certainly wasn't much darkness during the flight.
Our flight out of Frankfurt was scheduled to depart 65 mins after our scheduled arrival time so we were grateful that the pilot had the afterburners on as we landed only 2 mins late but then the excitement started.
Firstly the aircraft had to wait out on the runway for a few minutes to let another flight takeoff, then as we neared the gate we sat around for a few more minutes.
Having docked at the air bridge the rear door right beside us opened and then it started to become clear why we were in seat 57 - straight out the back door and on to the connecting flight. No such luck - "today we aren't disembarking from the rear you need to disembark out the front and get the bus to Terminal A"
Well almost last off the plane, hang around while a bus filled up, stop out on the airport to let a plane dock, then on a skytrain to another part of the airport, go through security, find gate B27 which as luck would have it was right at the end of the pod, run/fast walk to the gate only to see LH906 reversing out to takeoff without us!
We then had to find a service centre to rebook and were lucky to be booked on the next flight which was in 2 hours
So instead of the planned quick stretch of our legs and being back on another plane for the 1hr40min hop across to London I had plenty of time to ring Sodexa at Heathrow and let them know of the delay (Sodexa supply the car) as well as ring the hotel where we were booked for the night.
The rebooked flight went smoothly arriving in London @ approx. 2.40 and once through customs we then picked up our Peugeot 3008 which we will have the use of until we drop it off in Milan in 58 days time (God willing etc. etc.)
Filled her up at the nearest service station, set the GPS for our accommodation in Aston Clinton some 50kms away and off we started on our self-drive holiday, albeit a left hand drive vehicle being driven on the left hand side of the road until we get across to France later in the month.
The real adventure had finally begun!
Arrived at The Bell Inn which was a rather quaint pub and accommodation establishment of the type we had hoped we had booked.
Had our evening meal in The Bell and not long after hit the pillow as by that time we had been awake for over 24 hours.
And so concluded a rather eventful day but we dread coming back through Frankfurt in August as our flight from Milan arrives 65 mins before the scheduled departure of our flight through to Singapore - it couldn't happen twice, could it?
A late start, because we overslept, packed up the suitcases followed by a walk back down to Gastown to purchase some Canadian souvenirs.
There was another liner in today, Coral Princess, and as a consequence Gastown was abuzz & the souvenir shops were doing a very good trade, a trade we added to!
Back to the apartment to uplift our cases and we humped then to the Yaletown Roundhouse Skytrain station stopping on the way for lunch.
The train arrived almost as soon as we got to the platform and we had a rather interesting trip to YVR airport - interesting because as we travelled we were approached by a man who asked, in a rather Scottish accent, whether we had heard the news?
What news? The Queen has abdicated in favour of Prince William & she'll be known as the Kings Grandmother rather than the Queen Mother.
It didn't stop there - Catherine is a Jew! Camilla has a drinking problem! I trained horses for the Queen! ...... After a while he moved away as he could tell that we had no interest in his stories and he stopped further down the train beside a lady - have you heard the news I heard him say again and off he went on his story telling.
Before long we arrived at the airport, checked in and relaxed waiting for our Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt.
We had been allocated seats in row 57 but when they called boarding they announced boarding for rows 46-56 which had us wondering whether we were sitting outside on a tail wing or similar but there was in fact a row 58 as well!
The plane was a Boeing 747 which had been recently refurbished with a touch screen system and a very realistic flight information program.
It soon became apparent that even though Lufthansa is a Star Alliance partner as is Air New Zealand the service was infinitely superior to Air New Zealand's - a snack & drinks shortly after reaching cruising altitude and then the hot towel before meal service, metal cutlery, tastier food all absent on our earlier flight.
The flight left around 45 mins late and travelled what I would describe as the Artic Circle route up over Greenland - there certainly wasn't much darkness during the flight.
Our flight out of Frankfurt was scheduled to depart 65 mins after our scheduled arrival time so we were grateful that the pilot had the afterburners on as we landed only 2 mins late but then the excitement started.
Firstly the aircraft had to wait out on the runway for a few minutes to let another flight takeoff, then as we neared the gate we sat around for a few more minutes.
Having docked at the air bridge the rear door right beside us opened and then it started to become clear why we were in seat 57 - straight out the back door and on to the connecting flight. No such luck - "today we aren't disembarking from the rear you need to disembark out the front and get the bus to Terminal A"
Well almost last off the plane, hang around while a bus filled up, stop out on the airport to let a plane dock, then on a skytrain to another part of the airport, go through security, find gate B27 which as luck would have it was right at the end of the pod, run/fast walk to the gate only to see LH906 reversing out to takeoff without us!
We then had to find a service centre to rebook and were lucky to be booked on the next flight which was in 2 hours
So instead of the planned quick stretch of our legs and being back on another plane for the 1hr40min hop across to London I had plenty of time to ring Sodexa at Heathrow and let them know of the delay (Sodexa supply the car) as well as ring the hotel where we were booked for the night.
The rebooked flight went smoothly arriving in London @ approx. 2.40 and once through customs we then picked up our Peugeot 3008 which we will have the use of until we drop it off in Milan in 58 days time (God willing etc. etc.)
Filled her up at the nearest service station, set the GPS for our accommodation in Aston Clinton some 50kms away and off we started on our self-drive holiday, albeit a left hand drive vehicle being driven on the left hand side of the road until we get across to France later in the month.
The real adventure had finally begun!
Arrived at The Bell Inn which was a rather quaint pub and accommodation establishment of the type we had hoped we had booked.
Had our evening meal in The Bell and not long after hit the pillow as by that time we had been awake for over 24 hours.
And so concluded a rather eventful day but we dread coming back through Frankfurt in August as our flight from Milan arrives 65 mins before the scheduled departure of our flight through to Singapore - it couldn't happen twice, could it?
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