Awake before the alarm, a quick shave then loaded the car, careful to put the bathroom supplies into a clear plastic bag to show at the airport. Just a slice of toast and a glass of juice before our sad farewells and real thanks to our hosts, leaving at 9am. The car was due to be returned at Heathrow 1pm and according to the Tom-Tom, we’d be there 11:23am. With one planned stop, let’s just say that would be 12 noon.
Setting off was a real breeze, as at long last, the widened A453 link from Clifton, on the southern outskirts of the city, to the M1 motorway is fully open. A great run.
Even the 21 miles of 50mph/80kph restrictions were no problem and we made it to Toddington Services for a last Costa’s coffee and a toasted sandwich. Back onto the M1 and turned as usual, eastbound, or anti-clockwise, onto the notorious M25. London’s infamous orbital motorway. Often described as the largest car park in the country, another huge holiday travel weekend, the inevitable snarl ups across all 4 lanes, but thankfully, no major accidents or incidents - at our end anyway. A loose horse was causing chaos elsewhere though.
We eventually rolled into the Enterprise car park at 12:55pm – just about perfect, but that merely shows we lost an hour. Getting rid of the car was extremely quick and by the time they’d checked over the car (thanks Hannah!), the luggage was already on the shuttle and we were off to Terminal 2 – for the Air NZ flight NZ1 to LA.
Terminal 2 has been totally rebuilt and I have to say they seem to have made a great job of it. Most of us are never too impressed with airports but once we’d found the ANZ Premium check in (no queue), processing was very quick. Our two major cases weighed 24kg and 26kg respectively, but that didn’t cause a problem. (The ANZ limit is 23kg but we only had 3 to check in, although we were allowed 4 cases.) They issued tags for our hand luggage (two wheelie bags and a knapsack with the computer) and the advice was that we could use any of the 3 ‘B’ lounges, but they suggested B2, Singapore Airlines.
Immigration was no problem and we didn’t need to take off our shoes for scanning – then my knapsack got sent down the ‘reject line’! I thought it might have been because I’d removed the laptop battery and left it loose, but it wasn’t that at all.
We laughed when we found out what it was. My shaving brush – because it looked like a bottle in the scanner… The official was as amused as we were, so in LA, the shaving brush will go in the clear bag with the toothpaste.
We were warned it was about a 15 minute trip to the lounge, but we would be closer to the gate. We seemed to go upstairs, downstairs, upstairs, downstairs and finally upstairs again, where we had the choice of B3 – Air Canada, B2 Singapore and sorry, I can’t remember was B1 was. Probably Lufthansa. We didn’t go to the general waiting area as we had no wish to shop anyway, but from what we saw, the best choices are of course in the initial main area before you head off for the departure gates. Heathrow is large, and this is just one of five terminals.
Good choice. On offer with the hot food, was a very tasty red chicken curry, mushroom stroganoff, chicken (in white wine, cream and fennel - I think), plus rice and for the plebs, chips. The usual array of cold stuff too. I was very good and just had a blueberry rehydration drink, though a Magner’s cider was very tempting.
Paula tried to doze again.
The Air NZ rep came around to tell us ten minutes before boarding and we walked straight on.
I hadn’t looked too carefully at the tickets and I sat in the wrong seat! We were 6 & 7A, which sounds odd, but the layout was fine. Paula is sitting in 6A and my seat is to her left. (Pic)
This is the first time we’d tried Business Class and although expensive, when suffering from back problems earlier in the year, Paula had expressed some doubt as to being able to survive sitting upright. The ANZ system is just brilliant and we didn’t regret the choice. Great service from the crew, as always with ANZ, really good food. At long last, they even have Isaacs cider on board, so that went very well with my beef short ribs (boneless of course), spiced pumpkin, courgettes, nice potatoes and horseradish.
BUT, the noise! For regular cruisers on the Dawn/Sea/Sun, most will have walked the promenade deck 7 on many occasions. When crossing the rear of the ship, the noise from the water and possibly some mechanical noise is pretty loud and conversation almost impossible. Remarkably, it was about as noisy as that, yet we were ahead of the engines.
The seat folds forwards into a long, flat bed and although a duvet and topper pad is supplied, I elected to just lie, propped on pillows with a blanket, but sleep wasn’t easy, though relaxing was. It coped easily with someone of my height and is apparently 6ft 5" long. Almost 2m.
Spare a thought for those who came straight from Terminal 5, British Airways, as they had another system failure, so those who were transferring, would have done so OK, but their luggage was stuck at Terminal 5…
Disembarkation in LA from the aircraft, we were first off. Now then, US Immigration systems at Tom Bradley terminal.
- First, there is a long row of electronic ticket booths for those who have travelled to the US after 2008 on their current passport.
- That was both of us.
- Present passport to the machine and follow the on screen instructions.
- This includes the fingerprint scan – though a helpful official sorted me out here as it wasn’t reading initially.
- Once through that, the machine takes your photograph and prints out a voucher with your pic on it.
- Then Paula’s turn as part of our ‘family’.
- All OK, but no request for fingerprints - or photograph!
- We were then directed to ‘the troublemakers queue’…
- After three families in front of us, the Immigration official was very friendly and chatty and retook Paula’s prints and waved us on our way.
- All luggage safely off the carousel (trolleys are now free), then a queue to actually exit, where we handed over the immigration declaration form and the pic.
- Walk out and up the ramp and follow the signs to taxi vans, but no idea where the Super Shuttle stand was.
- Outside at 8:30pm, so 45 minutes from due arrival time. We had to ask where the Super Shuttle stand was and were directed to the right place, (turn left outside and keep walking, almost to the previous terminal) but it was now quite cool.
Although pre-booked, we had to wait over 30 minutes for the Super Shuttle to arrive, by which time, Paula was once again vowing never to come to LA ever again… She was cold, tired and queasy. There was no shelter and we had to sit on a grubby kerb.
The van eventually arrived, with one passenger already on board, then we stopped twice more and set off for Santa Monica, but one of the airport pickups, an American lady, never stopped gabbing the whole way… Thankfully, she was first off. One other passenger was a kiwi girl from Ponsonby who was at college locally.
This was then getting on a bit and the Saturday night traffic was extremely busy. We got to the Huntley Hotel, 2nd Avenue at 10pm. A real traffic crawl in Santa Monica. Easy, friendly check in, but the lobby was crowded with people queuing, apparently to get to the 18th floor, Penthouse which is a restaurant come nightclub. There were two bouncers on the lift entrance but at least we didn’t have to queue for the lift. Porter Joseph brought our luggage within seconds.
Room 308. Massive! Expensive. Clean. BUT, no hot drink facility, which is pretty poor for that price. We didn’t fancy room service at $5 a cuppa either, so we turned in – but there was considerable intermittent noise, which didn’t help, though we weren’t sure where that was coming from.
We crashed out at 10:30pm local time, which I think, equated to 6:30am UK time. Hopefully, that is the final hurdle now overcome, with just the relaxing day in Santa Monica and a return trip to the airport to cope with, before at last, we are HOME, well, the small matter of another long flight of course - and a 12 degree high in Auckland, oh, and a shuttle trip in Auckland where the traffic will be building! Having now sampled business class, at least we know that we will have the chance to lie down, but as our flight date was changed, our seat location has also changed, so it will be interesting to see if it is any quieter. We will be further back, in section 2.
Who cares? It has been a long trip and Paula is totally exhausted, which is not the idea of a long holiday and certainly not helped by the bug. The time to get through LA however, just makes Singapore a more attractive stopover, as the last two or three times, we have been at the hotel within about 30 minutes of landing. That is certainly now a major consideration for any future travel plans to the UK/Europe. It is also much cheaper, as an LA stopover seems to have rocketed in recent times. We don’t even get a reduction for checking out early either, even though they had several day’s notice.
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