The flights to India

Well there is lots to tell about the flights.  We had quite a few things go wrong between Jody and I.  Here is the story.

Jack misses his flight

Shirley and I left for the airport shortly after 5 pm for a flight departing at 8:05 pm for Ottawa. We to get to the airport with lots of time to spare.  You never know when you might run into some trouble on the road or at the airport.  There could be long lines at the checkin or at security.  When we got there the airport was mostly empty.

I put my credit card in the automated check in machine and then is when the problems started to happen.  The machine would not do the check in and it told me to see the check in lady.  She had a look at my confirmation sheet that I had printed off earlier that day and checked on the computer.

It turns out I was not booked on the 8:05 flight to Ottawa.  I was booked on an earlier flight that had already left.  Last October, I had talked to the travel agent about having a larger layover in Ottawa in case of bad weather.  The layover with the 8:05 pm flight was a little over one hour.  Now this is fine if the weahter is good and the flight is not delayed but much too close if there an issue with the weather or some other problem comes up. So we had moved to an earlier flight that left at 4:30 in the afternoon.  I never got the confirmation from her for the new flight or I printed off the wrong on on the computer. Anyway I missed the flight.

The check in lady sent me to the buy your ticket lady.  We had a talk and she confirmed that I was originally on the 8:05 flight and had been moved to the 4:30 flight.  She eventually was able to sort out the mess and get me in the 8:05 flight.  There were still seats available.

Jody almost misses her flight

Jody was sitting at home getting ready for her flight and doing some stuff on the internet.  She had checked with the Air Canada site to confirm that her flight was leaving at 10:05 pm.  She had confused the 22:05 time with 10:05 pm when actually the flight was at 8:05 pm.  She was doing somethingelse on the web when the Air Canada website refreshed and she realized at 7:05 pm that her flight was leaveing at 8:05 and not 10:05.

She hurriedly through on some clothes, closed here suitcase and immediately left the house and headed over to Michele’s place to pick her up.  Michele was ready to leave (luckly) and they were heading across the MacDonald bridge at 7:14 pm.  They made it to the airport in record time and jumped the line to get checked in.  It all went smoothly and they made it upstairs before the preboarding call.  They and their luggage made it safely to Ottawa.

Ottawa and beyond

We all got to Ottawa with out any problem.  I was able to talk to Shirley via Skype in the departure lounge in Ottawa and let her know that every thing had gone fine.

We left for London right on time and had an uneventful overnight flight.  I almost finished the noveL, I had picked up at the arport in Halifax.  This was the first of two nights that we spent sleeping sitting up on the airplane.

Heathrow and Gatwick

We got to Heathrow at 6:05 am local time.  Again no problems.  We picked up our luggage and spent some time in the airport before travelling on to Gatwick via bus.

Several buses leave about every half hour.  We eventually got on one and made the one hour trip to Gattwick without incident.  We got checked in and Jody had to check her mat bag because her purse was too large and considered a carry on.

Our flight to Goa was leaving at 18:35 (6:30 pm) that evening. We spent the day hanging around the airport and having a few light meals.  Eventually Sarah and Vanessa joined us in Gattwick and they got checked in okay as well.

Later on more and more people kept arriving in the depatures lounge. There were about 300 people on the flight.  It was fully booked.  Jody told us that Goa was like Florida for the British and these were mostly retired people heading south for a winter vacation.  We had a flight full of snowbirds.

The flight was uneventful.  Yet another night spent sleeping sitting up in an airplane seat with people right at your elbows.

We arrive in Goa

We arrived in Goa 30 mintues early. Then we waited for our luggage to arrive.  Remember there were about 300 people on the flight and another large flight had arrived just before us.  The crowd was huge and it took a very long time for all of our bags to arrive.

We waited and waited and then realized that Jody’s mat bag was not on the flight.  It took quite awhile to get that sorted out with the airport officials.  We have to wait a couple days for the next Monarch airlines flight from Gatwick to Goa for her mat to arrive.  In the mean time Jody will be using one of the rental mats at the studio here at Purple Valley.

The trip from the airport to Purple Valley Yoga Resort

Michele and Vanessa had gone on to the resort with one of the dirvers that had benn sent to pick us up.  Sarah and I stayed with Jody while she worked with the airport officials about the delivery of her missing yoga mat.  Eventually we got out to our drivers.  There were three of us and two of them.  We all wanted to travel in one car.  They said it was not possible.  One of them would end up travelling back empty and would not get paid. After a lot of discussion with the drivers and a couple of calls to the resort and much time passing we eventually came to a compromise.  I would go in one car, Sarah and Jody would travel in the other car.  I would only pay half fare and the resort would pay the driver full fare.

It was an interesting drive from the airport to the resort.  There are mostly no lines on the road.  There is an asumed lane in the middle of the road for both lanes of traffic to use when passing.  And everyone was using this middle lane all of the time.  Passing on the left, Passing on the right. And using the middle lane to pass when there was already cars in the lane coming towards you.

Blowing the horn all of the time to indicate that you are passing or about to pass or want to pass.  Motorcycles were abundant and yieled to all other traffic.  The buses and trucks were next and they made way for the cars. Most of the time.  The cars seemed to have the highest priority.  Most of the time.  I do not think I will attempt driving in India for a very long time.

Luckly everyone was using the same set of rules of the road and knew what everyone was doing or about to do.  We got the resort without incident.

We made it!

Tomorrow the yoga starts.  Ah,  time to relax and enjoy the heat. It was between 26 and 32 today.