Why are some people incapable of flushing toilets? It will never cease to amaze me. Do they do it at home? Or is it reserved for when they’re out? It can’t just be because of button germs because it happens with the sensor ones as well.
Anyway…
As the last vestiges of gout slowly leaked from my body, I packed for Florence. The weather continued to be wet. Actually, when we drove the girls to the kennel, the sky was blue, the sun was blinding and it was still raining.
I had a message from the airline just after 11am to say that the flight had been delayed an hour and a half because of the weather. This didn’t affect check in. It just meant hanging around Gatwick an extra 90 minutes.
Except that the time kept changing. From 16:05 to 17:25 to 21:55 to 19:50 then back to 21:50. It’s not great. I have no idea why the time kept shifting.
Given this is probably going to be our last short haul flight forever, it’s rather ironic that it was eventually delayed over six hours.
I thought Mirinda handled it well. There was one point where she thought we should ring Carol to come and collect us. I managed to talk her out of it.
We sat and waited in Starbucks where there are no carbs. We enjoyed toasted ham and cheese sandwiches, a cinnamon scroll and a gingerbread man. All without guilt.
While waiting I sorted out our accommodation. They were going to meet us until I told them we’d not be there till after 01:00. There’s a key box thing that took me a good hour to work out.
I then booked a hotel near the airport for tonight. I then reorganised the key box thing to pick it up tomorrow. It was all a lot of faffing.
Still, I didn’t have anything else to do.
The ever unhelpful Vueling Airline kept sending me emails regarding the flight. It’s quite difficult to express the pointlessness of this exercise given they told us nothing. Apart from the advice to look at the airport screens.
And the Airline Desk was no use at all. I went down to ask what was happening (on the advice of the screens) and was told by the only person there that she couldn’t help me because she worked for Norwegian Air. She said the same thing to the irate Italians behind me as well.
Finally, at 21:45 we had a gate. Of course it was the furthest gate. It was a long eager walk to it.
Then the completely full plane. In particular the seat next to me was over full with a chap who was about eight foot tall and five feet wide. He somehow squeezed into a very small space. Happily he didn’t feel the need to leave the seat before we landed.
The flight was a bit bumpy in places but Mirinda managed, aided by her newly acquired battery operated fan. We landed just after 01:00 and proceeded through the teeming rain to the terminal and long wait for customs.
Eventually we found out why. The weather in Florence has been horrible and the combination of torrential rain and southerly winds across the airport had effectively shut it down.
Flights throughout the day had been diverted to Pisa and Bolognia. We had been waiting for a break in the weather. Mirinda, of course, was worried we’d been left in Bolognia.
We managed to stumble into our unexpected hotel room at 02:30. The desk clerk was a lovely, very softly spoken, Italian man who was very happy to see us. This may have been because we were the final guests in their now completely booked hotel.
Some start to our Christmas in Florence.
