Another 5:00 AM alarm and the welcome help of my neighbour, Paul, got me to Luton airport in plenty of time for my 7:45 AM flight back to Alicante, Spain. Even though in the final boarding group, I got a window seat in row one so had a little more leg room.
Unfortunately, I seemed to be in the screaming section: row two, mercifully across the aisle, housed a young family with the most horrendous screaming child which my iPod was having terrible trouble blocking out. I came very close to offering to open the plane’s door and sling the offending infant into the jet engine intake. “Mayday, mayday – baby strike!”. So much more useful than a bird strike, in my opinion.
It was also the stinking rose section. Someone, I suspect the gentleman directly behind me, had clearly had lashings of garlic on his cornflakes. I opened my air vent which helped a little but I would be quite grateful when the Boeing flying cigar tube touched down at Alicante, its doors were opened and lashings of fresh air wafted in.
I was treated to the sight of a glory, a kind of circular reverse rainbow, surrounding the plane’s shadow on the surface of the clouds as we descended on our final approach into Alicante. After a very smooth 2 hours and 35 minutes, the wheels hit the runway and the welcome fresh air followed shortly thereafter.
Carol was en route to pick me up and was expecting me to arrive at terminal one, as usual. Me too. We came into Terminal two instead but this time I unusually had my mobile so we employed modern communication methods to find each other.
After an uneventful journey back to Lliber, I got a very ebullient welcome from the two pooches. The cats were a little cooler, as befits their detached demeanor.
We are once again waiting patiently waiting for Santa in Spain following our sad hiatus and wish everybody Feliz Navidad or, as they say in the local Valenciana language, Bon Nadal.
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