Hello,
It's been a long day. up at 5am, tiptoeing around the house like a daddy long legs (except im quite short really) trying my best not to awake the monster (and freddy) as that would mean endless pain for both the wifey and me on my return. 5.30am pickup by the nice driver in his merc S class, thats the one that is lovely to look at, got masses of leg room but sounds like a churchill tank whenever he touches the accelerator.
Get to the airport just past 6am where it was surprisingly busy. The driver informs me that at 4.30am when he dropped a colleague of mine off it was really quiet. That would be because everyone with any sense is still in bed. I should feel lucky with my 5am lie in then should I?
Get to the airport and as usual, check in, normal seat over the wing (that way I figure im on top of the fuel tanks so if we do drop out of the sky like a sack of spuds at least it would be quick), look that's just the way my brain operates. It's the same logic as when I fly business I feel better because people in business don't die. (so ive decided)
I fight my way through security, and grab a bite to eat and a coffee. I always seem to arrive ten minutes before the gate is announced, and therefore I always end up at the other end of the terminal to the gate that gets announced. A22? nope A4, A3? nope A21, dammit. as luck would have it I was wrong this time and it was A12 smack bang in the middle, just my luck, now the plane will crash...
So we have the usual crazy boarding dance of 'im cool man, im in no hurry ill just be cool and wait why all you stressed out business types queue up unnecessarily maan' Let me tell you something if you are one of these people. You try boarding BA's short haul europe flights on either a monday morning or thursday night with this attitude and tell me you can find somewhere to put your bags! Ill queue if I want to, Ill bloody stand at the front of the queue and if you stop me ill feed you to the engines.
So the flight itself was ok, bit bumpy in the clouds but im ok with that now, I would even marginally say I get a little kick out of it.
We land in amshterjam and have the usual 27 miles taxi to the airport. Basically Schipol has some agreement with BA that if you fly in from heathrow the only runway you are allowed to use is the north one. which is basically a different airport. I saw more of holland on that taxi run than the rest of the trip combined.
I get off the plane and as I depart notice the first officer (who flew the plane as the captain obviously couldnt be arsed) looked about 11 years old. i swear the captain just brought his son in on some 'bring your kid to work day' and let him have a go... that can't be safe on an airline surely?
Next I have to figure my way to getting a train from schipol to rotterdam. Now my final destination was brielle so I thought like a nocturnal soap covered prison warden i'd have a stab in the dark and see if any trains went there.
I approached a guy in what I could only assume was some kind of railway related uniform who looked like a cross between mr bean's mutilated cousin and lurch taking a s$%t and kindly asked if he spoke english, of course he did. and I asked if I could get a train to brielle, he satisfyingly stated that brielle didnt even have a train station. So I asked him his recommendation and he stated 'go somewhere else'. Helpful.
Now luckily my good wife has sussed out some possibilities for me on the good old interweb previously so I knew that worst case I could head for Rotterdam central and make my way from there. So that's what I did. got the train.
As a side note my headcandy headphones totally disintegrated on the train. must be something about the dutch air. it was headphone padding carnage.
I got to Rotterdam and found a friendly taxi driver who could drive me to brielle, for the princely sum of 82 euros. Not that I had alot of choice, it was that or the bus to some other town nearer and go from there but didn't fancy that!.
In the taxi we passed the wonders of the industrial side of rotterdam, canals / barges / oil tankers / refineries / factories - all surprisingly interesting to look at.
Got to brielle and found the hotel, was dutifully informed that I couldnt check in for another couple of hours. Joy... Brielle is quite a quaint querky little town, like a kind of yodeling tetbury. Had a wonder around for a bit took a few pics and got cold so went back and sat in the hotel restaurant and did some work.
Whilst I was sat there one of the oddest but most benial things occurred. the place was totally empty when 6 people came and sat next to me, then proceeded for over an hour to negotiate (in dutch of course) over the new crockery for the restaurant. It turns out that the dutch don't have a word for 'sideplate' (other than 'sideplate') I found this quite amusing.
Once I could check in I went to my room and caught up on emails while I waited for my client to turn up.
Once he did we headed over to the site where we are running the programme tomorrow and set up for the course. all went very smoothly.
Then we came back and grabbed some chinese and a couple of beers.
So I'm knackered now (which apparently in germany means drunk so mildly applies in both respects) so I am off to bed.
Will let you know how the rest of the trip goes. The journey home challenged by the deadline of a flight to catch should be interesting at least...
Joe
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