Home to Dubai

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It should really be very simple. The first step is to catch a flight from London Heathrow to Dubai. OK there are a couple of things that need to be done first to prepare, but nothing too hard.
So, wake up on Thursday morning full of cold (that is all three of us - a real family affair) and very excited. Eden is manhandled through basic dressing, and Lisa takes her to nursery as normal.
We start to pack the pile of stuff that has been accumulating on the bed for a few days and it all fits into our bags with no problems. This is going well. Just need to clean the house now.
What a chore!! I have no idea who normally does this, but hoovering, dusting, cleaning toilets and the like is no fun at all. Three hours later it is done, but what a rubbish three hours that was.
So now we are ready. It's 13:00 - but we can't pick Eden up until 14:00, so we either go without her or we wait around the house. We have already eaten the contents of the fridge and run the dishwasher for the last time, so we can't eat or drink. So Lisa watches Neighbours to get her on the mood for Oz, while I go through some photos of pre-WWII atrocities to get me in the moodfor the trip.
At 14:00 we pick up Eden and head off to Peter and Claires (Lisa's parents) as they will be taking us to the airport. We stop for a cup of tea and to do some last minute research for the Sri Lanka leg of the tour, and then we are really off.
Heathrow T3 is the same as it alway is - very busy and lots of Q'ing. Got checked in and wandered around until boarding time. Into the final lounge and at last there is something for Eden to do. A 10 foot long padded airoplane to play on. She is straight in to it, headfirst into one of the two "seats", which are deeper then she thinks. Stuck!! legs in the air and face to the floor. Very funny to watch, probably less entertaining to do. Spent the rest of the wait for the plane (delayed due to blah blah blh ...... ) watching her climb on over and off this toy plane. Must get her one for xmas.
Advice we got from experienced travellers with children was "sleep when they sleep" on the plane. Good advice. Lisa got 10 mins kip, I got about 20. Eden was not interested in sleep at all.
By the time we arrived in Dubai it was 03:30 by our body clocks and we were all a little fractious. Hats off to Deira Meridien Appartments, who provided the transfer from the Airport and sorted out early check-in.
By 10:00 local (06:00 bc time) we were all getting some much needed kippage.
By 15:00 we were out and about. No plan for the day (and not really in the mood for too much) so cabbed over to the City Centre Mall for a wander and some food, and then bck to apartments for a quiete evening. Bed by 22:00 on the basis that we need to start doing proper stuff tomorrow, and so must bank some sleep and shake off the lurgi that is definitely slowing us down.

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