After dumping our luggage in the luggage room we headed to the tube and headed to Green Park.
After a packed day which included (in no particular order); Buck Palace, watching the planes fly overhead in Green Park, Covent Garden, London Transport Museum, Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, Whitehall, we headed back to the hotel in Hammersmith to pick up our bags. After faffing around for a while at the hotel we got the bags and trudged back to the Underground station and down the steps to the platform. By this time I was desperate for a sit down... Unfortunately due to the tube being full I didn't get a seat until Boston Manor...
To make sense of the next part, you'll have to know that I don't use a watch (I kill them in short order) and my phone was switched off. I was confident that we were okay for time... Got to a self serve check in kiosk and after a bit of faff, got the boarding cards printed - seemed to take an age though. Then looked around for a bag drop desk that was empty. Of course, half were unstaffed, the others were busy with two or three groups in each queue. After waiting in line for about five to ten minutes, there was a voice saying 'anyone wanting to drop baggage?' We all turned round and saw that the BA Promotions (ie upgrade desk) agent was free. Hubby raced over with the trolley, prompting a 'you could be in the Olympics' remark. She was very friendly and also tolerated the boys questions very well and nicely.
Headed straight over to security, got our pictures took again with lots of well tolerated questions from the boys. Headed to the security machines. Was through with a very small wait - less than two minutes. All of us were hungry and needed a bit of a sit, so we headed straight round to Giraffe. Hubby's first question was 'how quickly can we be served?' Answer came within 10 minutes. I said to Hubby, what time is it? He said, "7.50" Given our flight would leave before 9pm - I was a bit shocked about where the time had gone. Probably why I was so relaxed was because I hadn't known the time at all!
Nachos and drinks were ordered and eaten and drunk and suddenly it was twenty minutes later!
We were departing from A7 which was only a short walk away down the escalators and thankfully not a bus gate. We got to the gate and they had already announced preboarding. I asked one of the gate agents if we could come through and they quite happily let us through. We had about five minutes wait and then we were boarding via a long jetty. I was even welcomed back by one of the cabin crew - first time this has ever happened to me on BA (lowly, tp less Blue!)
I had managed to change our seats at T-72 to row 3 again (2 on one side and 2 on the other). Sat down and watched the plane fill up. Lots of 'information messages' about baggage as everyone got on board. Plane was completely full.
We pushed back on time and taxi'd to 27 L. It was great seeing three Virgin Planes on the stand. Then we passed the herd of A380's most with an airbridge in place at the upper deck exits. We took off in a westerly direction. Flight was smooth, service great, extra biscuits given out which pleased the boys... We got to around Manchester / Leeds and began our descent.
Didn't do the usual approach over Tynemouth / Whitley Bay area and we were soon on the ground - about 15 minutes early.
After we'd got the luggage and exited into the terminal we used the courtesy phone to call the meet and greet service as detailed on the ticket we'd been given only to find that it wasn't the right service... So I switched my mobile phone back on and found that luckily my data service was up and running again so I could get into my Gmail account and find the confirmatory email...
We were home by 1030pm after a quick stop for chocolate (me), sweets (boys) and milk (hubby needed it for his tea!). House was chilly but at least the cats were glad to see us! (It really is much, much warmer down south!). And we are already planning to do it again in the Spring!
Boys were upset though - no chance to do any last minute souvenir shopping so they had to go out and spend their money today!
