Unfortunately I was not as excited as I should have been as I ended up spending the day in bed at the Westin with the doctor decideding whether or not she could give me a fit to fly certificate and having an IV drip to bring my blood pressure up. This was nothing really serious, just a bit of tummy trouble caused by "working" too hard for the first part of the trip and then body was completely knackered and open to being hit by bugs. Glad I didn't have to go to hospital as Tourism Fiji decided it was best to get the doc to come to me. Had the maintenance man come and screw a hook into the posh wooden fittings to hold the drip, there are some photos but I haven't been able to get hold of them yet.
Once again Air Pacific had been very kind and put us in the bubble and given us lounge access, not a bad lounge but I just sat in corner nodding off while the others enjoyed bubbly and snacks.
Boarding was very efficient and once upstairs it was pretty full at the front but they block off a few rows at the back for crew rest. There only seemed to be 1 member of off-duty crew so even before take off I moved to one of these to get a row to myself.
Quite a long, languid take off roll as the flight was pretty busy and I think it feels different from upstairs and you don't feel they are making as much of an effort to get off the ground, the engines didn't seem to be roaring like they normally do but maybe that's because I am usually well behind them!
As soon as the seatbelt sign went off it was armrests up, 3 pillows, 2 blankets (with seatbelt on over top of blankets to make sure I wasn't woken) and I stretched out with my feet on the bins and head by the aisle and pretty much passed out! Woke up about 30 mins before landing as they were clearing the cabin and had to beg them to let my buy a Air Pacific 747 model (FOR A FRIEND!!!) as they were closing up the duty free. Managed to get it OK but he is gutted as Air New Zealand don't even sell Duty Free, let alone models on their flights now.
Landed fine and into a completely different version of US immigration, friendly smiles from the guy who dealt with me and hardly any queues. When we were waiting for the customs check there was a table with two guys from Homeland Security who looked like they were dressing a crab! I looked over at them all confused and gave a quizical expression.
I then realised my mistake having read on here what has happened to people who have done anything that is out of the ordinary and a feeling of dread (to go with the other unpleasant feelings I was already experiencing) came over me. So, up stands one of them and he comes over.
The rest of my travelling companions subtley shuffle away from me.
I prepare to be yanked out of the line to a little room and not to get on my next flight.
Fortunately this was not to be! It turned out the guy was from Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service which is now part of Homeland Security and he was really happy that someone had taken an interest in what they were doing.
They had confiscated a load of fresh cashew nuts from a pax and were now checking them to see of they were infected with some burrowing bug which they are trying to track the progress of to try and contain it. We had a chat as I moved along the queue and then as I got to the counter he wished me a pleasant flight. I think I still had adrenalin coursing through me as I just smiled inanely at the customs man and he waved me through, not even looking at my bags. Once again dropped them off for them to go on to London and we walked back to T2.
Move to the red side...
