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Published: July 18th 2014
I spent a leisurely day on Thursday packing and doing last minute chores which were interrupted with the news of the catastrophic plane crash in the Ukraine. As I was getting ready, I pictured the victims of that plane crash getting ready for their business trips or vacations as I was doing and my thoughts and prayers go out to the families who lost loved ones. It is not something that one wants to hear when getting ready to take a trip overseas. Nonetheless, that is exactly what I had to do. Lisa, Rich, Ben and Jacob picked me up at 4:00 p.m. to take me to the airport with a stop on the way to pick up my friend, Sharyn. Ben was his usual inquisitive self and Jacob was delighted with the site of planes taking off. Lots of hugs and kisses and we were ready to check in and go through security which was painless and after a lite dinner we went to our gate to wait for boarding.
When we had picked out our seats, Sharyn wanted to sit by the window and I chose to sit on the aisle and our hope was that we would
have an empty seat between us which, of course, was not the case. Planes more often than not are being flown at full capacity. The man who took that seat was a well-dressed man who turned out to be a pilot for Delta who was flying with his wife and 2 sons to Helsinki. He told us he flew there every year to visit his wife’s family. He was very friendly and the time flew by. We arrived in Iceland on Friday morning and had a short layover. It rains a lot in Iceland and it was rainy and cool when we boarded the plane. We actually had to walk outside to the plain and climb the stairs to the plane. On this flight, we also met a young man who had been touring the United States for 5 weeks. We compared experiences about our travels making the 2-1/2 hour flight go by quite quickly. Sharyn and I had very little sleep and we were starting to feel it.
Once we gathered our luggage we took the advice on our fellow traveler and went to the Duty Free shop and bought some wine. By the time we got to
our tour guide and she realized we had been shopping, she wasn’t too happy with us as we had kept others waiting. We offered our apologies and in our defense it wasn’t the shopping but the length of time it took for our luggage. I made a mental note to be punctual in the days ahead.
We made the trip by van with another couple to our hotel which was centrally located in Oslo. It is very nice although the room is on the small side. We rested for a bit and then midafternoon we set out to find dinner. We realized we really hadn’t eaten yet and it was 4:00 in the afternoon. Our tour guide pointed us in the direction of a nice little Italian restaurant one-half block from the hotel. It was very good and we felt a little renewed. At 6:00 we had our welcome drink and orientation meeting. There will be 29 people on this tour and many of them have been on Gate 1 tours which was reassuring. Also, the majority of them were either close to retirement or retired. I think it will be a good mix and am looking forward to
the next week. The weather has been warmer than usual for July and the forecast is for high 70s to low 80s. That works for me.
After our meeting, Sharyn and I decided to walk down to the waterfront which we could see from our hotel. We went way out of our way to get there but finally made it and spent some time just watching people and enjoying the beautiful evening. We stopped on the way back to the hotel for water for our trip tomorrow. Bags out by 7:00 a.m. and then a city tour of Oslo and some leisure time.
At the time I am writing this it is 10:30 p.m. and I don’t even think the sun is thinking about setting.
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Deborah Fenton
non-member comment
Happy holidays
Thanks for sharing your adventures! So lovely to feel I am right there rather than sat at home, where it is cold. Looking forward to living vicariously through you!! I know you will have fun. Hope you have the best time. Cheers! ? lots of love from me xo