Close call

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I left the Lakes District on the 4th and trained down to London where I stayed with Pecky (Aaron) and his wife Shannon. It was good to catch up with some familiar faces and reminisce about how crap our Avon soccer team was from the year before (we lost every game). (Thanks guys for letting me crash on your couch and for introducing me to soft shell crabs, possibly the best food I have ever eaten).

Anyway, on September the 6th I left for London's Stansted airport a fair while before I was supposed to fly out. I stopped at a shopping centre on the way and got some Euros out, and killed some time by looking around. Something that I was to regret later on.

I got to Stansted with about 1 hour and 50 minutes before my flight, what I thought would be plenty of time. I checked in, and as I did their baggage belt broke so I had to take my bag to a separate place to get it checked in, I did this and still thought I had plenty of time. That was when I saw the cue to get through the departure gates. I walked to what I thought was the back of the cue but it veered around a corner and went for miles more. My boarding time was 6:20, and it was already 6:30 before I got to the front of this cue, I think I must have sweated out about a pint I was so stressed.

The reason why it took so long was the airlines have now restricted the size of cabin baggage, and if your bag doesn't fit through the contraption you have to get rid of stuff or repack. My bag was looking a bit big, but there was no way I was gonna piss about repacking so I just forced it through the machine, I would have jumped on it if I had to. Once through this, I finally got to the security checks, where I had to take off my shoes and put my bag through the scanners. By the time I had finished that 5 minutes remained before the plane was supposed to leave the tarmac. I put my shoes back on and ran like hell, as fate would have it my departure gate just happened to be the furthest away in the whole airport. I heard them making their last calls as I turned the corner and headed into the home straight. Fortunately another lady, was sprinting too and we just made it. As I took my seat on the plane I vouched I would always turn up ridiculously early for departures from now on, especially for Ryanair flights because you get to choose where you sit, i.e. if you are early you don’t have to sit next to the fat guy.

Anyway the flight was smooth, Ryanair is a budget airline and you pay for food and drink if you want it. As an incentive if you buy anything on board you go into the draw to win a return flight which they draw out before you get off, not bad odds really.

I was a little stressed about getting to Italy because I was staying In Bologna and the airport was an hour away in Forli. Thankfully I got through customs fast and my bag was first out on the conveyer belt, so I could go out and find the right bus.
I got into Bologna bus station around midnight, and used pigeon English and a map to sort out a taxi ride to the hostel. I almost got in the wrong side of the taxi (I forgot they drove on the right).

It was a relief to finally get there, and was great to catch up with Brendon who had arrived during the day from Florence after being at his brother Simon's wedding. (Congrats Simon). After all the stress I slept well that night.

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