Columbus, Ohio: Heading home...

The Brekkie Shack in Columbus, Ohio, close to the Aloft hotel, has a good vibe to it. It's bright and breezy and there's loads of decent 'brekkie' options including the House Made Granola Bowl of yogurt topped with in-season fruit and chia-sunflower seed granola, not forgetting a honey drizzle. That and a mug of green tea and I was set up for the day. I have to say that I've been eating decent food out here, not too much of the burger and fries, which is the default cuisine in the USA. There was plenty of temptation to eat badly, like an amazing-looking carrot cake and other 'cakey' stuff that was crying out to be eaten, but I resisted and left the the place feeling good about myself and, therefore, life in general. 

The plan was to head for the so-called German Village, a district of Columbus, and a book shop called the Book Loft. Here was a book shop that consisted of different rooms full of different types of books and if you're in to books it's the place to be. I didn't buy anything because I've got enough books on the go already. James O'Brien's How they Broke Britain and Thurston Moore's Sonic Life are the books in question. I didn't want to add another one to the mix.

Katzinger's Delicatessen, German Village, Columbus

After lunch in Katzinger's Delicatessen it was time to head back to the hotel and start packing for tomorrow's long journey home: two flights, one from Columbus to New York's JFK airport and then the transatlantic hop to London, although that word 'hop' is probably an understatement. 

Later, with grey skies and the rain hammering down, I stood under cover outside the Aloft Columbus hotel. There was a man on a down-at-heel-looking push bike with a rear wheel puncture. He couldn't fix it because he didn't have a repair kit and was standing there soaking wet wearing a blue cagoule preparing himself for the moment when he'd somehow make a dash for it. I looked at the rain and wondered how the hell I would get to the Starbucks across the parking lot without getting soaked. And then I remembered the base ball caps in my room. I'd been at an event where some of the stands offered freebies in the shape of tee-shirts and baseball caps. I had around four of them upstairs in my room so I turned on my heels and found the cleaner in my room. "It's your room, you can stay here if you like," she said as she changed the sheets on the bed. And yes I could have stayed and made small talk but I preferred to let her get on with her job. I told her she could have one of the baseball caps and then headed downstairs to tackle the rain. The walk to the Starbucks was less than five minutes across an exposed parking lot and when I reached my destination I wasn't that wet. I ordered an English breakfast tea and tried to read O'Brien's masterpiece. I was about to finish the Jeremy Corbyn chapter and then move on to the one about Dominic Cummings, but simply couldn't face it. I know the story, I've lived it: the Brexit lies, the bigotry, the racism, the British thinking they're something special when they're far from it; so after a short while I simply sat there drinking my tea and looking out of the window. Eventually the rain stopped and I was able to walk back across the lot to the hotel without fear of a soaking.

Our last dinner in Columbus was at the Cap Diner. There were no seats in the restaurant but there was room in a kind of temporary area, or additional space, which had a canvas roof and heaters to keep away the cold, although they didn't do a brilliant job. The rain hammered down on the roof as we awaited our food. I changed seats so I was a little closer to the source of heat but it wasn't brilliant and when the food arrived I was disappointed to note that I had been given two chicken breasts rather than the one I had expected. This, was, of course, America where the portions are huge, and because I'd been eating lightly most of the week I could barely finish the meal. I managed the chicken breasts but I left the vegetables. Catherine opted for two starters, which were more manageable than my one main course. On the next table a woman received her dessert: a huge chocolate cake at least a foot high.How anybody could eat THAT much chocolate cake I don't know, but she took it in her stride and laughed as she scoffed it. Cardiac Care Unit, here we come, I thought as I watched her pigging it with inner disgust. We passed on dessert and headed back to our respective hotel rooms, me in room 626 and Catherine in 526 directly below me on the fifth floor.

House made Granola Bowl, Brekkie Shack

It was early but it was time to hit the sack, do some last minute packing and then leave the Aloft and head to the airport. But first a 'game' of pool. The inverted commas are because neither of us were any good and, therefore, the game wasn't at all real, we were just trying to pot the balls regardless of the rules and it was more fun than playing for real.

I set my alarm for 0700 and then lay in bed until I fell asleep. I awoke numerous times before the alarm went off and I jumped out of bed and set about packing. For me it was always going to be a case of 'last minute packing' as I figured putting stuff back in the case would be easy. There's something awful about checking out. I've never liked it and I can't understand why, but the very thought of packing stuff away, trying to cram everything into a suitcase, has never appealed. I managed to get everything in and after a shower I headed down to the lobby where I met Catherine and we both walked across the lot to the aforementioned Starbucks for our last breakfast where we had been eating the same thing all week: granola with yoghurt and some kind of jam, not forgetting an English breakfast tea for me and an iced coffee for Catherine.

Our time in Columbus had run out and we jumped into an Uber and headed for the airport. There was time for tea at a Starbucks when we got there and then we boarded the flight to New York/JFK. The flight was full and I hate full flights. I sat next to an Egyptian Professor of English Literature. She was travelling to New York where she has a 20-hour stop-over and is planning to get a hotel room. From Doha she flies on to Cairo to be with family and friends and then she comes back to a new job. Currently, she's at OSU (Ohio State University). It was a short flight and there was a little turbulence at the end, but soon we found ourselves in JFK looking for somewhere to have lunch before the transatlantic night flight to London Heathrow. Our choice of restaurant was O'Neal's and it wasn't that brilliant. I ordered a chicken burger with fries and a no-alcohol beer and Catherine had a vegetarian dish of some sort and a Coke, it might have been a vegetable-based burger.

There was no menu, just a QR code on the table. The idea was that we ordered on our phones. I'm thinking about buying a Nokia 3310 so that they have to provide me with a paper menu or I'll take my custom elsewhere. I can't stand it. Tech complicates everything. I can't go swimming these days without logging in to an app, so I don't bother going. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a technophobe, it just annoys me when people put blind faith in technology. Even placing a boarding pass in the 'wallet' on my iphone is crap, especially when the phone runs out of power and I have to ask for a paper boarding pass. This happened recently in Helsinki.

I wandered around the airport and found a food court area just to sit down and write a few things in my notepad. Catherine was elsewhere doing her own thing and we met up later at the gate and sat there chatting for around an hour before it was time to board the plane. I was in seat 18C, which offered a lot of much-needed legroom, but there were two people sitting to my left and in front of them was a couple, meaning that in terms of legroom I had the best deal.

It turned out the flight was around six hours, which was brilliant and I passed the time reading Sonic Life by Thurston Moore, which is an excellent book. I never watched television or listened to music and as the flight was so short I focused almost entirely on pondering what I had just read. There was no turbulence.

We landed around 0640 having been scheduled to touch down around 0740. There was a slight delay after the plane had come to a halt as they didn't appear to have any buses. I quipped with a fellow passenger that the first negative voice we heard had to be English and of course I was right.

The plan was to get an Uber home, but I wasn't sure how it all worked and then considered waiting around for a 'normal' taxi or jumping on the Heathrow Express to Paddington and then travelling on the Underground to Victoria. But no, not after a transatlantic flight, so I hoofed it back to the third floor of Heathrow's car park and then waiting for an Uber. There was problems on the M25, something to do with a bridge, and this meant going through London: Hammersmith, over the Thames on the Wandsworth bridge, through South London and home. I was feeling fine and sat around chatting for a short while, but then decided it would be good to get some sleep so I hit the sack and woke up around 1600hrs. We took a drive early evening to Oxted for an Italian meal and then I sat up until 0100hrs watching Clarkson's Farm on Amazon Prime. 

I slept well, woke up, had breakfast and then around mid-morning headed off to Knole for a breath of much-needed fresh air after a bowl of pea and mint soup and a chocolate chip cookie, not forgetting a pot of tea.

It's almost 1800hrs on Sunday evening and the sun is shining, the trees appear to be in full bloom, my lemon balm plant is out and so is everything else.. Summer arrived while I was away. I left a cold and rainy United Kingdom and returned to a sunny, warm country. I'm feeling pretty tired so I'll stop writing now.

Starbucks across from the Aloft Hotel, Columbus Ohio.

Aloft, Columbus, Ohio – wonderful hotel!

I reached the Aloft Columbus late but was so relieved to be there after the three flights it had taken me to find myself at the front desk. I'd queued for a taxi outside Columbus airport and was whisked along the highway in a six-cylinder Lincoln. The driver said very little, but he was pleased when I complimented him on a great car. There was, it has to be said, plenty of power under the bonnet.

The Aloft is only a short drive from the airport, which is good, and the hotel is a short drive from the city's convention centre so it's pretty well connected.

Room 626, Aloft, Columbus University District, USA

I was directed to room 626 on the sixth floor and found my way there, once on the sixth floor, along a dimly-lit corridor. I love a dimly-lit hotel corridor as it makes me feel as if I'm in the X Files.

Room 626 was large and square and thank God it wasn't one of those hotel rooms that require the occupant to insert their room card into an aperture to power-up the room, although I suppose they prevent hotel guests from losing their key cards. To my right a large bathroom, more of a wet room with only a shower, no bath. This is good news because I never use a bath these days, it's always a shower, even at home (where we have both). Beyond the bath to my right is the huge space of the rest of the room. A large, black flat-screen television on the far wall facing a large double bed, a seating area to the right of the television offering bench seating and a Formica or Melamine oval table with a boomerang pattern and under the television a fridge (with nothing in it) and the usual tea and coffee making facilities on top.

The Aloft is obsessed with technology and it's quite annoying until you get used to it. There's nothing worse than tech for the sake of it. The lift (or elevator) is more complicated than a standard lift and then, in the room, I found a small Marshall amp. Or at least that's what it looked like. It was, in fact, one of those smart speakers that allow you to stream music on Spotify or Apple Music or whatever you use. At home I have a rather smart (and expensive) Bose system. I liked the Marshall amp and for some time thought it was a radio that simply didn't work. When I got round to asking somebody on the front desk they told me what it was but added that I'd need to download an app to get it working. No. I'm sorry, I'm not going to do that. Far too much faff and when it was suggested that the hotel 'engineer' could run through things with me I thought no, I can't be bothered, I'll do without. The last time I remember listening to music in a hotel room (on a CD system) was some time back in the early noughties, in the Malmaison in Manchester in the UK and it was all a little too emotional and 100% driven by alcohol. So I left it alone, other than to turn it on and off occasionally just to hear the hard rock bass and lead guitar riff that accompanies turning it on and off; that amused me no end for a while until I told myself to shape up and stop being so stupid. On the other side of the bed is a little round emitter of white noise (or that's what I've been told it is); it's the sort of thing you might need to get to sleep if you suffer from ADHD, which fortunately I don't. Oh, I almost forgot! There's the customary large and very noisy air con system which, at night, makes you think you've been transported to a beach somewhere and the tide's coming in fast. It took me until my last night to work out how to switch it off. There's wood-effect laminate flooring, no wardrobe to hang any clothes but they're quirky enough to provide some black metal girders and a few coat hangers and there's a safe, which I'm leaving well alone after the last time I used one. There's a hair dryer and, I think, an iron (I'm not exactly sure) but there's no ironing board so using it could prove disastrous. Again, I'll leave well alone.

I like the Aloft. The room feels like home and I yearn for it when I'm not in it. 

The spectacular view from room 626, Aloft, Columbus, USA

There are a few problems, but not many. The first one is the shower and sink. In a nutshell, the jet of water coming out of the former is not strong enough to give an invigorating shower and the dribble coming out of the tap over the sink is similarly lacking in power. It's annoying that the bath towels are not in the bathroom as I tend to bowl in there, have a shower and then realise I've got to tip toe across the laminate floor with wet feet dripping water everywhere as I cross the room to get a towel. Perhaps one of these days I'll remember to take a towel in with me (there's one in there now awaiting my last shower before I check out).

Another problem is there's no breakfast room or restaurant downstairs. One of the great things about staying in a hotel is the breakfast and having to go out for it is a little annoying, but not really that much of a hassle as nearby there's a good Starbucks where it's possible to eat a healthy breakfast and not have to gorge on pastries and scrambled egg and sausages and mushrooms and all the usual stuff you get in a self-service hotel breakfast operation.

The hotel is 'quirky' but I often feel they try too hard on that front, as, indeed, do 'boutique' hotels in general with their madly designed furniture and fittings that simply refuse to follow the hotel designers' motto of 'function before form'. Not that Aloft has any madly designed furniture, it just has a quirky vibe. There's an oversized game of Connect Four in the lobby area along with a pool table and a chess set and '2024' in silver inflatable letters giving across the message that this hotel is fun and should be enjoyed... which, to be fair to the hotel, is exactly right. I love it, it has to be said because the friendliness of the staff, the cleanliness, the upbeat design and the comfortable rooms make it a cut above the average American hotel. It has something special about it and I know for a fact that I'm going to miss it and that I'll wonder for days, when I'm back in the UK, who is in 'my room' looking out over Columbus as I did.

Chicago O'Hare: Things go badly wrong...

Boston airport is rubbish. Really rubbish. There's no coffee shop where you can sit down and enjoy an English breakfast tea and something to eat. Everything is takeaway on the coffee shop front and customers are expected to take their order away and sit somewhere else, in a communal area. I hate that. I had a decidedly average lunch in a place called Lucca where there was no dessert offering or hot beverage menu. Imagine that! You can't order a green tea or a coffee or whatever because there's nothing on the menu. Don't get me wrong: I didn't want a dessert. I'm trying to stop them completely, erase them from my life so I suppose there not being a dessert selection is good. But in all honesty I could have done with sitting there for a bit longer after eating my decidedly average chicken burger and fries. But yeah, as a result, Boston airport is being branded as rubbish by yours truly. And yes, I hate it. That said, I hate everything right now and I'm taking it out on Boston airport and, actually, Boston itself. I thought it was supposed to be some kind of place you have to visit. New England and all that. Boston, Maine. I started thinking about Stephen King for heaven's sake. He lives in the state of Maine, doesn't he? I'm sure he does, but anyway, this ain't about Stephen King, it's about me and my predicament, which we'll come to shortly. For now, let's keep knocking Boston airport (air side). What about the WiFi? What about it? It's shite! So shite that I have resorted to writing my bile in a notepad and I'll have to copy it in to the lap top later on.

This is just a minuscule part of the queue, believe me...

My hotel was shite too AND it had bed bugs! Yes, I saw one when I jumped out of bed, which means there must be more of them. I was staying in room 308 of the Embassy Suites right by the airport. Alright, it was a case of 'any port in a storm' but hey, bed bugs! Who needs them? And to think I slept with the bastard.

Sixth floor, Aloft Hotel, Columbus

I shouldn't be in Boston. I should be in Columbus, Ohio, but it wasn't to be, thanks to Chicago O'Hare's immigration system or people or whatever. The flight over from London was fine (see previous post) but when we got off the plane and headed for the bit where they used to ask if you were a member of the communist party we found a huge queue. And I don't just mean a huge queue, I mean a fucking huge queue, longer than I have ever seen in my life. It was huge, it was monstrous, it was enormous. If you think you know what a big queue is all about, I can tell you without fear of contradiction that the queue I was forced to join was the biggest ever, no challengers. It was so big that I was standing in it for more than three hours. THREE HOURS! In the process I missed my connecting flight to Columbus and, as a result, a whole new world of shit opened up to me.

The first problem was finding another flight to Columbus – there wasn't any. Or rather there was, but it involved flying to Charlotte and then flying again to Columbus and I wasn't keen on doing that. All I wanted to do was find a hotel for the night and then start again in the morning, but against my better judgement (and remember, my judgement ain't that good after flying eight hours across the Atlantic and every minute wishing it would all end and I could be where I was supposed to be, ie in Columbus).

The boredom of Boston airport and, indeed, all airports...

We were directed to the American Airlines information desk 'opposite K8' and soon realised that flights to Columbus are pretty damn rare and that the Charlotte option was all that was open to us (not that I was prepared to believe that, there had to be another way was my thinking).

Lucca – nothing to write home about...

There were problems. A storm was brewing and, as I sat there on the plane looking out at the thunder, lightning and rain I realised that I didn't want to put myself through an ordeal of extreme turbulence, not after an eight-hour flight from London. I was tired and now I was fed up too and I knew that I simply couldn't face the flight to Charlotte. I had to find another way and so I left the flight which would, I discovered, be sitting on the tarmac for over two hours. Meanwhile, however, I was queuing opposite K8, something I really didn't want to do again, at the American Airlines desk trying to find an alternative to the Charlotte flight I'd just kissed goodbye, not that it was going anywhere. There was an alternative that involved changing airline to United and flying to Boston and then finding a hotel in the city. I really didn't want to do it, I was in a mess and I just wanted to sleep until I felt better, but I couldn't. The United flight departed at 2145hrs with me on it, and I can't remember what time it got in but it was late and then, as I waited at reclaim for my bags, the machine ground to a halt and it was clear that my bags were still at Chicago O'Hare. Thanks to the baggage reclaim guy (although he was wrong) I was told my bags were most likely at Columbus, but I knew that bags didn't fly without their owners, they're a bit like dogs (who sometimes get lost). I hoped and prayed that they would be in Columbus but something told me they weren't going to be there.

I waited at B6 for a long time...

So I needed a hotel for the night and it turned out that many people were in the same position because of the storm. A man from Costa Rica was waiting for an Embassy Suites shuttle bus so I joined him and jumped on, checked in to room 308 and finally got to sleep around 0245hrs. I managed around two hours' sleep and then woke up in a frazzled state of mind. There was no way that I could simply nod off so I got up, showered and eventually went downstairs for breakfast. That was when I discovered a bug in the bed. Whether it was a so-called bed bug, I don't know, but it was definitely a bug of some sort, which really put me off, I can tell you. I told the girl on the front desk and the driver of the shuttle to the airport. I wonder if they'll do anything about it?

Around 1000hrs I took the train from Airport to State, got out and wandered around. Every shop sold tacky souvenirs: fridge magnets, shirts with 'Boston' emblazoned on the front and other cheap ephemera everybody could do without. I couldn't resist a fridge magnet... and a teeshirt with 'Boston' written on it.

I didn't see much of Boston to be fair, but the bits I did see were not very impressive, it all looked a bit like Peterborough on a dull day. I walked along State Street and then wandered through a couple of covered markets, one selling different types of food, the other selling souvenir tat of all shapes and sizes.

Bored and fed up I walked back to State railway station, took a train to Airport and then strolled through a park to the hotel where I messed around on my lap top before heading to the airport far too early and then found myself bored shitless. I was there for a long, long time waiting for a flight to Columbus. Initially I figured that with my flight at 1710hrs I'd be in Columbus around 2000hrs, but while the time counted down and down until I was expecting the flight to simply arrive at the gate and we all board, it kept getting put back. Suddenly, from saying, say, 23 minutes until boarding it was saying 41 minutes to boarding and on and on it went. I feared it would be cancelled. There was little to do but wander around looking at different gates and seeing if there was anything worth stopping for, ie food and drink outlets. The whole thing had left me tired and angry. My colleague, who stayed on the flight to Charlotte never got to Columbus so, if this was a race (albeit a weird one) we were almost neck and neck, although she had the advantage on me and eventually arrived a few hours ahead, but I wasn't far behind. Her flight, as I might have said, sat on the tarmac for a couple hours before heading to Columbus where her bags awaited her; my flight left later, probably around 2000hrs, I can't remember exactly. The pilot said something that annoyed me. I mean, how can I sit back and relax and enjoy the flight after he said "we're expecting a little weather halfway through the flight and will put the fasten seat belts notice up." Great! That's me on tenterhooks.

On the way to Columbus

The first part of the flight was a white-out. There was thick cloud until we reached 30,000 feet, our cruising altitude, and the rest of the flight was easy, even with the odd bit of turbulence. I don't mind turbulence if I can see what's going on outside the window – that's why I hate night flights.

When the plane landed I went straight to baggage reclaim and told the girl there that my bags were in Chicago O'Hare – or so I'd been told. She confirmed that they were indeed at O'Hare and that she'd get them sent to my hotel – Aloft in the university district of Columbus. They were sent on to me and arrived Monday evening, leaving me just one day to wear the jeans and all the other clothes I'd put on Saturday morning. I looked alright to be fair so there was nothing lost despite the situation. In other words, all was fine and I slowly recovered from the ordeal. I got around seven hours sleep and the hotel was fantastic (of which more later). 

Notes from Flight AA47 from London Heathrow to Chicago O'Hare, USA...

4 May 2024: Compared with yesterday's inclement weather, today was a breath of fresh air and most welcomed. There were clear, smokey blue skies when I woke up and the good weather continued. I awoke around 0222hrs mainly because I was fretting about the long flight ahead of me, but the good weather made me feel a little better about the trip, not that I wouldn't have rejoiced had an announcement came through about the event I was attending being cancelled. Not that I really wanted it to be; it's good meeting with the Americans once a year and this will be my 10th event, or 10 in a row, so to speak, so I'm kind of a veteran of the circuit. Who wants to be a veteran?

There are always hassles when travelling and this trip proved no exception except to say that it all turned out okay (or did it? More later on that one!).  

I started my journey in a taxi, but when the driver intimated that there might be a problem with the M25, I asked him to take me to the railway station where I jumped on the 0810 train to Victoria and then took the tube to Paddington where I picked up the Heathrow Express. I decided to purchase a single ticket as I might get the Elizabeth Line when I get back to the UK next Saturday at the early hour of 0740hrs. I'll be flying back from New York, having already flown from Columbus to New York that same day.

En route to Chicago and enjoying every minute!

The check-in at Heathrow (Terminal 3) was relatively easy, although I had tried checking in on my iphone whilst on the Heathrow Express, but no joy. It didn't matter, it was all fairly smooth and soon I met up with my colleague for breakfast. While I'm not keen on Wagamama, the fact that breakfast was an option changed things slightly. I ordered a Japanese omelette and a bright green 'power' drink for added positivity. Unknowingly, I'd need that positivity later in the day although in all honesty I think it deserted me.

Soon it was time to head for Gate 31. In fact, we almost missed the flight as the gate was announced as 'closing' so we hoofed it, but when we reached it there was a full complement of passengers still sitting around waiting to board. A false alarm if ever there was one.

I had a great seat, 12A, and I soon discovered that 12B and 12C would remain vacant and that I would have the whole row to play with, not that I played with anything other than my notepad and pen [writing this very post]. Either way it was a result, the whole row to myself and loads of extra leg room. While I started to settle, I couldn't drum up any enthusiasm for the journey. However, put it this way: having seat 12a and an empty row makes things a lot better than they might otherwise have been. I've booked a similar seat for my return journey from New York, so let's hope there's nobody else in the row. Right now, however, I just wish I could be in Chicago or, better still, my ultimate destination: Columbus, Ohio.

Monty's Bakehouse pastry – the best!

The food on the plane was fine. Nothing to write home about admittedly, but acceptable. The choice, as always, was pasta or chicken and, as always, I chose the latter. It was served with rice and spinach and while there was other stuff – like a rock hard bread roll, cheese and a chocolate cake dessert – I refused everything else bar two crackers and a small bag of pretzels that had arrived ahead of the aforementioned meal.

The plane (with me in it!) has departed from Heathrow, gone over South Wales and gently passed over the southern tip of Ireland and is now mid-Atlantic running a true air speed of 553 mph as it approaches something called the Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone, whatever that might be; we're flying at 37,000 feet and there are all these odd places, like Gloria Ridge, Eirik Ridge and others that I'm guessing are markers of some sort, but I neither know nor care.

I don't like flying at the best of times. Or rather I don't mind it, but if I could take the train I would. Whenever I go to Europe I try to let the train take the strain, but you can't train it across the Atlantic... not yet at any rate! Imagine a bridge!

One thing I do like to have is a choice and when such a thing eludes me, I get a little irritated. So, I'm sitting here, the lunch service finishes and they decide to dim everyone's windows and giving everything a dark blue tint. Personally I prefer the plastic shutters or blinds or whatever they're called because they give the passenger the choice of whether to look out of the window or not. I called a member of the cabin crew and she fixed it for me.

So now I sit here with five hours and 37 minutes to go and I'm already bored shitless. I will probably read some of James O'Brien's How they Broke Britain, but not yet as I feel very restless and anxious. There's five hours and 23 minutes to go.

I'm trying my best not to eat badly. It helps that during the week I've been visiting a place called Busy Beans (in Redhill) and having light salads for lunch and trying also not to eat more than a couple of slices of bread each day.

There's four hours and 50 minutes until we reach Chicago O'Hare and I'm the only one with my window "open", so to speak. Everybody else has that aforementioned deep blue tint which has plunged the cabin into darkness, it's as if it's the middle of the night and people are sleeping and doing stuff in the dark making my little corner the only ray of light. I certainly don't want to pretend it's night time when it isn't, but I feel under pressure as if they're all whispering under their breath, asking me, pressuring me to 'turn that light out' but I'm not going to; I don't want to watch their crappy movies or listen to the airline's awful choice of music. I was hoping I'd at least be able to listen to that great guitar riff from Dire Straits' Money for Nothing, but there's nothing but crap stuff and likewise the movies.

I mean, who the fuck is Robert Finley? Who is Tony Joe White when he's at home? Who is Pony Bradshaw? Andrea Von Kampen? Anybody? Natalie Hemby? Matt Berninger? You get my drift, I'm sure you do. There was hardly anything worthy under 'Classic Hits', nothing I knew at any rate. Celebrate Women's Voices? No! Who the hell is Camille Yarbrough? Only Isaac Hayes stood out, but there was no sign of his Theme from Shaft. And let's not make out it was easy to hear any of this stuff: the sound of the plane's engines put paid to that and I didn't particularly want to mess around poking earphones in my ears.

I am considering watching an animated movie without sound. But which one? There's a lot of dross. In fact, what a piss poor collection of 'entertainment'.

Outside the cloud has gone away and I can see the Atlantic Ocean below me and it looks flat calm from up here at 38,000 feet. The plane is heading for St. Johns, Newfoundland, at 555 mph and we've left behind the Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone with just over four hours flying left to do.

Watching an animated movie with the sound down is fantastic and reminds me of 'old times'. I can just glance up at it now and then while I'm writing and occasionally staring out of the window. It's great.

But then I was caught unawares by one of the cabin crew. "Vanilla ice cream, sir?" At least with American Airlines you get called 'sir'. With British Airways you're only called sir if you're in business class, revealing, of course, the British obsession with class and privilege. The female cabin crew member held out a small and inviting tub of the stuff and I foolishly weakened. It was rock hard so I'm leaving it alone for a while. Actually, it wasn't very nice, there was no taste at all, but then perhaps that's vanilla ice cream for you.

The animated movie I was watching, incidentally, is called The Inventor and its good just to glance at it occasionally without really knowing what's going on.

As if by magic, the cloud is back, it's like a huge sheet of ice stretching into the distance and there's no let-up. We could be in the Arctic, but I know I'm not, we're almost over Newfoundland and the city of St. Johns.

"And they wandered in to the city of St. Johns without a dime."

What a great song! Steely Dan, the Royal Scam, a great song and an amazing album, but not on the sound system of the flight.

There's three hours and 53 minutes to go and the rest of the aircraft is still in darkness. I have the only source of light and I love it, just me.

I've been clock-watching for a fair bit now and I'm thinking that when the big hand of my watch completes another circuit there will be just under three hours to go. We're still flying at 38,000 feet, the cloud outside still looks like a sheet of solid ice and there's a man behind me who keeps coughing. Just my luck if he has Covid, but let's hope not. Sniffing, coughing, clearing his throat, he's a big, fat fucker and I hate having him sitting behind me spreading his awful germs everywhere.

The Inventor is a strange movie (or it is if you watch it with the sound down). When I get home I'll see if it's on Netflix or Prime and watch it with sound on. What I can say is this: it's well done, nicely put together. I just can't get over the cloud below me and I can't imagine the plane cutting through it. There's three hours and 42 minutes to go and that equates to 1,905 miles more to travel.

I'm hoping that the back of my chair will act as a shield and keep the bloke behind me's germs in his court and not mine, hitting the back of my seat and then hitting him in the face, a continuous loop.

The cloud has dispersed again and in places I can see the Atlantic Ocean. I hate clock-watching but that's what I'm doing. There's three hours and 30 minutes left to go.

And now there's two hours and 12 minutes until we reach O'Hare and it's possible, here and there, to see land below, the odd lake, even roads are visible. The Inventor ended and now I'm watching Deadland, but this time with sound. It looks good and I'll definitely be looking out for it when I get home, but it isn't that good, nothing ever is.

I'm wondering if there will be any more food, perhaps not. Outside the clouds still look solid and snow-like again and we've just passed over Portland, Maine – according to the flight map. It's lunch time in Chicago, which is kind of weird as it was sort of lunch time when I left London.

I could do without a connecting flight to Columbus, but that's the journey. Fortunately, it's a short flight, under an hour I would imagine once we're in the air. 

One hour and 46 minutes to go on this flight. I'd like to think some more food is on the way, just to break up the monotony, a cup of tea, a biscuit, anything, but it's gone all quiet on the Western Front, so to speak.

With just under an hour to go, Lake Michigan hoves into view on the left hand side of the aircraft. Is that port or starboard, I can't remember. I think it's the port side. If my memory serves me correctly, we head south (or turn left) at some point and then begin our descent into Chicago O'Hare over the lake. We have yet to lose altitude with 59 minutes to go and the cloud a little more dispersed than it has been.

It's been a quiet flight. I haven't heard any kids screaming or babies crying. In fact, come to think of it, I haven't seen any families, unless they're all at the rear of the plane, but I don't think so.

The lights are coming on and the people seem to be reviving themselves, their movies finished, their books read and I swear I can smell coffee, not that I'll be having any, perhaps another tea instead. Lake Michigan is visible again from my window and I'm pretty sure we'll be banking left at any minute. The coughing and spluttering man has returned to his seat – where the hell did he go? – and the cabin crew have just whizzed by with a trolley, meaning they are planning to serve something, probably a hot drink. The sun is shining and it's just dawned on me that, give or take, I've been writing for around seven hours.

Perhaps that wasn't Lake Michigan as we haven't veered left yet so perhaps we might not veer left after all. I can't remember.

Wow! Monty's Bakehouse red pepper, tomato and paprika pastry – or calzone as the cabin crew called it. Amazing! And I could certainly eat another one, that's for sure. There's 48 minutes to go and we're still at 38,000 feet so perhaps I was wrong about Lake Michigan. In fact, I WAS wrong, it was Lake Erie.

The plane is making its descent into O'Hare as I write this. We are between Flint and Grand Rapids, both places you see mentioned on destination boards if you walk past the gates in an American air terminal. We're flying at 32,000 feet and counting. Those white clouds – or rather that blanket of white cloud – that looks a little more like clouds now, but it's possible (just) to see land below it.

I'm always amazed at how the cabin crew just get on with it, while I get more and more anxious about the whole thing. I can see a patchwork quilt of fields below me and soon they'll be asking me to stow away my table top or whatever it's called.

It's time to swallow as the pressure starts to affect my ears, we're now at 30,000 feet.

I forgot all about the security, ie immigration and customs. A video explaining the whole process is now being screened – and now I can see Lake Michigan, it's huge, it has beaches!

I never listen to the information videos on a plane, I simply follow the signs when I get there. It's funny how, now we are over the lake, we've left the clouds behind. They look like a huge white hedge which, come to think of it, will be waiting for us on the other side – we're surrounded – although I reckon we'll slip underneath them by the time we get there. There's around 20 minutes until we land.

"Flight attendants, please prepare for landing."

I'm now balancing my notebook on my lap and waiting for when we land. We're at 8,999 feet now and counting. I'm guessing the plane is lining itself up with the runway. In the distance I can see a bank of clouds waiting for us, but perhaps we'll be low enough to miss them. 7,002 feet and 324 mph. We bank right and then straighten up. Now we're banking right again. It's very hazy out there. I can see a boat of some kind, cargo barge, and we're still banking right, but have now straightened up again. I can see the city, skyscrapers clustered together close to the lake, the sun shining as we approach dry land. The lake sparkles in the sunshine, there's a marina, houses, car parks, a motorway, cars travelling hither and thither, the plane shaking a little as a suburban church pops up. More baseball pitches, more houses, more wooded areas and soon I'd imagine, there will be airport buildings. We fly over a runway and we land, the engines go into reverse thrust mode and we are down at 2.45pm local time (0845pm in the UK). Time to head for immigration and baggage reclaim.

Notes from Easter Bank Holiday Weekend...

With the blossoms out and the weather almost perfect, bar the occasional shower of rain, I decided this week to bite the bullet and get back to my rides of old. I opted for Oxted and rode 10 miles for a haircut, but first a green tea and an apricot croissant, sitting at the back of a Caffe Nero reading my book, Osamu Dazai's No Longer Human, an interesting book if ever there was one. I've finished it and now I've moved on to James O'Brien's How They Broke Britain, another great book. It was good to be back in Oxted and back on a 20-mile ride, which I later extended when I turned right off the 269 and headed down Beech Farm Road instead of continuing straight towards Knights Garden Centre. It was pleasant in Oxted. The sun was out and I made a point of looking in to the charity shop next to the Nero, just for a wander around. I like charity shops but rarely buy anything, perhaps one day.

The ride back is a little daunting as Titsey Hill is involved and I haven't riden up any really steep hills for some time, but managed to take it in my stride. This was the Saturday before Easter Sunday and when I reached home I felt good and set about trying to fix the lawn. The week before I was almost done with it when the rain fell from the sky and everything had to go back in the garage: lawnmower, leads and extension lead. On Saturday, after the ride I decided to resume the job but it wasn't easy, the lawn being wet and the mower not really up to the job. In other words it's still in need of fixing and currently looks a bit rough around the edges.

Yesterday, Easter Monday (make that Bank Holiday Monday) I was planning to meet Andy at Sheree's. Unfortunately, I slept badly and had to abort, but later went out on at short ride of around six miles and then headed out to one of those stately homes and gardens. We visit a lot of them and to be totally honest I only go for the cafes as there's nothing better than a cappuccino and a Cornish pasty and possibly some cake. Although I've decided not to have any more cappuccinos or cake and I'm hoping to stop chocolate too*. So instead of coffee and cake I ordered a cheese and ham sandwich and an English breakfast tea, well, an English black tea, there was no telling whether it was a breakfast tea and to be frank they all taste roughly the same. You might say that a cheese and ham sandwich was just as bad, if not worse, than a cappuccino and a slice of cake and you'd be right, but the options weren't that good. In all honesty, I tend not to eat a lot of ham (hardly any) - or cheese for that matter - so it was a bit of novelty and I must say that I enjoyed it.

Andy's back from both Spain and Cornwall. He took the train to Spain, travelling all the way from London to Paris on Eurostar and then taking a train to Barcelona and onwards from there to Malaga. I was hoping to hear about his adventures but of course my lack of sleep prevented it. Still, there's always next week.

* I've managed to stave off a craving for cappuccino but I still need to put in more work on not eating cakes and chocolate, although I've cut back considerably on chocolate. My current obsession as I write this addendum on 18 April, is carrot cake.

Non-stop rides and other stories...

Over the last few weeks I've started doing non-stop rides, meaning rides where I don't stop for a cup of tea or a bun (or both). Why I've started these 'new' rides, I don't know, probably out of a sense of not having much in the way of time on my hands, but still wanting to get out there and 'do a ride'.

Don't get me wrong. As the weather starts to improve - and it is starting to get more pleasant out there - I will be getting back to my usual routine; that of riding to, say, Oxted, and then sitting there nursing a green tea and an apricot croissant whilst sitting in the sunshine people watching and enjoying the pleasant summery mornings that tend to come our way when the clocks go forward.

I expect we'll be here tomorrow morning. Hopefully no rain!

There are, of course, many other signs that mean the same thing. One such marker is blossom on the trees. Long before the leaves appear on more conventional trees (is there such a thing as a conventional tree?) there are blossoms that bring out the Japanese in the locality who like to stand in front of my house (and others) and simply marvel and admire the blossom tree in my front garden. It isn't in bloom yet, but give it a few weeks and it will be, it's a bit of a late starter compared to other blossom trees in the area.

Seeing a tree in full blossom is a joyful experience. As I walk down West Hill towards the alleyway on my journey to Purley station (two miles) I always pass a white blossom tree in full bloom. I'm aware, by the way, that I'm using the word 'tree' and 'blossom' quite a lot and I will go through this post later to see how many I can delete.

From a cycling perspective, seeing all these signs, these precursors of summer time fills me with happiness as I'm not somebody who particularly likes the winter months. That said, when I awoke this morning, fully aware that later in the day I'd be outside mowing the lawn, I did start to feel a little down. Why? Because I don't want to mow the lawn. I hate mowing the lawn, getting the mower out of the garage, faffing around with the power lead and the circuit breaker and finally pressing the button and moving back and forth across my rather large lawn. In fact, it's not so much 'lawn' but 'lawns' - I've got three of them if you count the front garden. And let's not forget that the first cut of the year is the most challenging. I normally start at the highest setting and then step down to around setting three before I can genuinely say the lawn is done. But no, not today. Rain stopped play. Hailstones rained down upon me and I was forced to scamper around getting everything I'd taken out of the garage back in it.Secretly, I'm rather pleased that my lawn mowing was cut short, I just don't feel ready to mow lawns and the fact that it started raining proved me right. 

What I do like about winter - apart from fireplaces and watching movies and eating chocolates and all the cosy things I've been used to doing for years - is not having to do any gardening. Because I haven't had to mow the lawn since October 2023 I've spent my time visiting genteel places like Tunbridge Wells and sitting in cafes eating cake and drinking cappuccino. Bakewell tart, coffee & walnut cake, millionaires shortbread, you name it, I've enjoyed it at my leisure over most weekends since the mower was put back in the garage three months before Christmas. Well, now it's been woken up and it won't be hibernating for another seven months - not that I want to wish my life away. I've just got to get used to the fact that over the next seven months or 28 weeks, I'll be mowing the lawn at least every fortnight.

While lawn mowing is not my favourite pastime, it is good for me. My dad always told me that my garden was my gym and that I should get out there and keep fit in the process. Personally, I prefer to ride a bike into the sticks and find a coffee shop where I can sit and read a book for half an hour and then ride home again. Admittedly, it takes time and when I get back mid-morning the last thing I want to do is mow the lawn. However, that said, after a ride I always feel particularly energised and after a cup of tea I might well head on out there and get it done. Remember, it's only the first cut that takes an age, after that it's no more than an hour if I'm just doing the back garden. I prefer the back to the front lawn because out front there's talking to be done. Neighbours to pass the time of day with, passers-by always ready with an encouraging word or two and I don't like it. At least out back there's nobody to disturb me, I just get on with it and when the true summer arrives I can enjoy sitting on the patio with a huge mug of tea and possibly a cake from the supermarket while I admire my handy work.

When the rain did stop play the lawn was three quarters done and that means it'll be nagging at me for the next seven days unless I get out there tomorrow and finish it off. That's the plan, but first a ride, most likely to be Tatsfield Village and Sheree's Tearooms and then I guess I'll have to get down to it, although secretly I'll be praying for rain. Tomorrow's ride (if it happens) is around 16 miles. Today's ride was just over 14 miles. I had been considering riding into Oxted (a 20-mile ride) but somehow I couldn't face that uphill ride up Titsey Hill. I rode to Botley Hill, turned at the roundabout and was immediately hit by a cold northerly wind. It went right through me as I pedalled north and never let up until I turned right on to Beech Farm Road. I quite enjoy non-stop rides as they make me realise that, where cycling is concerned - and bearing in mind that I've been riding the bike virtually every weekend since 2006 - I'm fairly fit and could do something silly like cycle around the coast of the UK, like Mike Carter or Anna Hughes. They've both written excellent books about their respective adventures and both are good reads for different reasons. But I figure that if I can ride non-stop for, say, 20 miles, that means I could easily double up and do 40 miles a day (at first) and then, as I get fitter and fitter day-by-day I could hit the 70-mile/day rate. I often think about it: on the road before 0800hrs, 20 miles under my belt in around 60-90 minutes, a rest somewhere with a cup of tea and then onwards until lunch time and then perhaps another 20. I could probably ride 60 miles a day without too much grief. I don't know how long it would take me to circumnavigate the UK coastline (or whether I'd ever have the inclination or the time to do it) but it's one of those things I think about at night, in the dark, in the middle of the morning when all is quiet. I imagine myself wild camping somewhere and waking up as the sun comes out, making breakfast on a stove and then jumping on the bike.

Something else I find myself thinking about in the dead of night when all around me are fast asleep is camping, sleeping under the stars, stealth camping in a wood. I often try to identify places where I could hunker down without detection in a small tent; there are loads of places. Even today, while out on my non-stop ride, I kept passing places that would fit the bill nicely. I think that if I was homeless I wouldn't be sitting in a sleeping bag in a shop doorway, I'd be out in the fields. I'd try to keep fit by walking a lot and I'd probably walk into the town during the day but sleep at night in the woods, away from the nutters who hate the homeless.

It's 2037hrs, that's just gone 8.30pm if you don't understand the 24-hour clock. There's one of those royal documentaries on the box. I've just eaten breaded cod with stir-fry vegetables and a dash of sweet Thai chilli and I'll probably hit the sack later, armed with a digital radio and BBC Radio 3, Night Tracks, a programme that comes on around 2200hrs and ends at 2330hrs. It's great.

Leeches don't work on 'slime' innertubes...oh I wish I'd known that!

Not a great deal to say. Cycling has been weekly at best, once a week at worst and always Tatsfield Village. Nothing wrong with the destination, but the weather has been poor, on and off, for weeks. They're saying that it's the wettest February for years. I'm not sure whether the phrase "since records began" is appropriate, but I wouldn't be surprised.

Washpond Lane, Saturday 9th March 2024

Andy and I have been enjoying the sanctuary of Sheree's Tearooms, and the fact that Sheree actually exists makes it even better. We meet on Sundays mainly and enjoy a good old chinwag about something or other, it's a relaxing time when the troubles of the world can, by and large, be forgotten about, and believe me we've both had a few problems of late and they've taken their toll. My sister and Andy's wife have both passed and it's not been easy for either of us. I can't speak for Andy, obviously, but during the lead-up to Christmas, after my sister's passing in early December, I went through the mill a bit. I kind of calmed down by Christmas Day and, give or take, while the emotional side of things will take time, the physical symptoms, if that's what they were, have disappeared. I think (although I can never be sure) that I suffered from panic attacks. On the day of my sister's passing I should not have been driving, but I was and I felt terrible inside. It's hard to describe if I'm honest, but somehow or other I managed to fight through it. Cycling has helped a great deal and so did being at Sheree's drinking tea, munching a Biscoff biscuit and chatting with Andy. I know that Andy found Sheree's equally healing – and still does.

The Tatsfield rides were pretty straightforward, just a scoot along the 269 and then hanging a left at Approach Road, past the famous Tatsfield Bus Stop, which is now confined to the NoVisibleLycra history books as we tend to enjoy a café rather than a bench exposed to the elements. This, as I've mentioned before, was largely a result of lockdown, or rather the aftermath of the lockdown, and I think coffee shops are here to stay as we both feel that, in addition to the sanctuary offered at Sheree's, it's also a reward for getting out there and taking a ride.

I've been rather lucky on the puncture front of late. The reason might well have a lot to do with fitting one of those green slime inner tubes on my rear wheel. Weeks, months even, went by without a puncture and I began to feel invincible until, the week before last, I was riding along the 269's off-road path and suddenly the familiar wheel wobble meant just one thing: a puncture. Throw in some coldish weather and some rain and the fact that I had no idea about how slime inner tubes worked (leeches don't adhere to them, Andy told me later) and you have what I regarded as the perfect cycling disaster. Well, not so much disaster, just annoying. There I stood by the side of the 269, rear wheel resting against a gate, holding an inner tube, trying to find the puncture and getting ready to use a leech. Why didn't they stick, I wondered, as I worked through an entire pack of 'scabs' or whatever they were called. It seems that Leeches (the proper ones) have disappeared not only from bike shops but also from the internet and we're left with inferior products (what's new?) But let's get back to me standing in the rain, surrounded by discarded 'leeches' wondering what to do next. I'd told Andy that I was liable to be here for ages (and I was). It took a while to get the tyre on and off and then get it back on AFTER I remembered that my inner tube was supposedly designed to fix its own punctures. I noticed the green spot where the puncture was located and without any leeches to plug the hole I decided to put everything back together again, pump up the tyre and then hope it would get me home. It did! The drizzly rain didn't let up and by the time I got home I was unpleasantly damp, having not brought my cumbersome cape along for the ride. I put the bike into the garage and then, the following morning, I noticed that the rear tyre was still pumped up the following morning. To be honest with you, the puncture event happened on the Saturday and I think (although I can't be 100% sure) that on Sunday there was more rain and the whole idea of a ride to Tatsfield was simply aborted. It was the following Sunday that I met Andy at Sheree's and he told me how leeches don't work on slime inner tubes. Well, I know now. Like I also know that I'll avoid the off-road path if I can. The problem there was that I was labouring under a false sense of security. The rule, as we all know, is that the off-road path along the side of the 269 is puncture city, but for some reason I rode it a good half dozen times and never got a flat. I put this down to the new (ish) rear tyre as I figured the front tyre wasn't as vulnerable as the rear, but then it happened. Anyway, let's not go on about it anymore. It happened, the slime inner tube worked and all is back to normal. As I rode home on that drizzly day, however, I must say that I allowed myself to get a little angry about the whole episode. I tend to let small things get me down, which is silly and completely pointless, but I figured that the best way to change the direction of my emotions was to stop at the Esso garage and give the bike a much-needed jet clean, although it was my soul that needed jet cleaning. The bike had been covered in mud for some weeks and it was great to blast it all off and then ride home with a tyre that was still holding out.

I can't remember how things turned out after that; I carried on working during the week and cycling at the weekend and the rain and poor weather continued too. Today has been weird, although what is today? I can't even remember when I wrote this post, it was certainly around a week ago – up to this point – probably longer. Overnight there was a lot of wind and rain and then during the day the rain competed with the sun; one minute it was raining, the next minute there was sunshine. I decided to walk rather than cycle. Late in the afternoon I embarked upon a three-miler and I managed to escape the rain. I stopped halfway at a Costa in Sanderstead High Street for a green tea and, yes, a Bakewell tart and then I walked back. And now I'm sitting here writing this blogpost with the shit show that is the BRIT awards on in the background (so the BRIT awards will give you (and me) an idea of what day it was, not as long ago as I thought).

Hopefully the rain will have stopped once and for all tomorrow and I'll be able to get out on the bike and head for Tatsfield village or Biggin Hill or Westerham or wherever. I doubt I'll go to Biggin Hill as there's something depressing about it, especially the Costa Coffee there, which is a little dull. I don't know what it is, but some places don't work for me and Biggin Hill is one of them. It's fine on a hot summer's day but not when the weather's bad. There's always Oxted but right this minute I can't handle a ride up Titsey Hill.

It was a week later when I decided, on a Saturday, to ride the non-stop 'Botley Bastard', a trip up the 269 and then into Woldingham and home – around 15 miles; the following week I rode the Washpond Weeble (see photo of sheep above) – 12 miles – and now it's Thursday and the weekend lies ahead of me. I'm now thinking about Oxted or, perhaps, another non-stop ride, another Weeble perhaps or another Botley Bastard. I'm guessing Andy and I will be meeting on Sunday at Tatsfield. 

Helsinki to London

It was another one of those occasions when I arrived at the airport early, giving me the full two-hour airport experience. A colleague had dropped me off and now I found myself at the check-in area. Having checked myself in whilst on the night boat to Helsinki, I was annoyed to discover that there was still a lot of faffing about with technology. First I had to place my passport into a machine and then I had to print out the label that I would need to attach to my suitcase before sending it on its way to the aircraft. I was having to do all these jobs that used to be done by a human being. I often wonder what those human beings are doing now, perhaps they're unemployed.

Just one of the snacks I enjoyed, this in Brod & Salt, Stockholm 

Then, it was time for "security" and for some reason only one scanner was working, just one scanner. There was a huge queue, which I found annoying. Where were the people who could be operating the other scanners? Perhaps they were unemployed too, but hold on, this is Finland, it's a cool country (actually, it's freezing) but what I mean is, it's laid back and relaxed and things normally work so well. So I was amazed to discover English hassles in Finland, but soon it was over and I was left to my own devices for a whole two hours. I needed to find a decent restaurant in which to chill out. As you know from reading the previous post I chose Nordic Kitchen from where I ordered an open salmon sandwich, a couple of bars of Fazer chocolate (the small bars) and a green tea. I then sat there eating.The sandwich was excellent, the Fazer chocolate even better and the green tea nice and refreshing.

So men have tits and wear dresses do they Prada?

My flight was due to leave from Gate 46, which was a longish walk from where I was sitting, but there was plenty of time so I wasn't in any way stressed and I wasn't planning on using the automated walkways. But I wasn't as chilled out as I should have been. For some reason I was not relaxed enough to read my book, Eat, Sleep, Cycle by Anna Hughes, so instead I just sat there deep in thought about something mundane. I was, of course, on the last leg of my trip and was looking forward to the flight home to London, albeit a flight that was scheduled to take off after dark at 1935hrs, meaning I wouldn't be able to see a thing out of the window. I was sitting in seat 23a, which is odd as the gate coming out here was 23 so the number had cropped up more than once on the trip. I find myself getting superstitious when I fly. I start by adding up all the numbers on my boarding pass, ie the flight number and so forth, and I hope and pray they never add up to 13. It's stupid, I know, but it makes me feel better about things. One of these days, of course, the numbers won't go in my favour and I'll be faced with a dilemma: change my flight or go with what I've got. I know, it's really stupid.

Twisting corridor, Birger Jarl hotel, Stockholm

Technology is the most annoying thing. I decided to transfer my boarding pass to the 'wallet' app on my iphone and then the battery ran out so I had to approach the person on the gate and ask for a printed boarding pass. What I hate more than anything is a "full flight" and this was one of them, every seat taken and everybody with hand luggage that really should have been stowed in the hold. I think the thing I hate most about flying is the other passengers. There was one woman with a suitcase, a laptop AND a large bag but nobody thought to stop her from boarding with all three. Most of the other passengers were the same and this caused a lot of hassle. All the overhead lockers were jammed with bags and rucksacks and the cabin crew were left to make it work, which it did in the end.

Ready for minus 14 Helsinki.

All flights are late to take off and this one must have been around 30 minutes later than scheduled. We roared down the runway and up into the skies and most of the flight was fine, but loads of problems started to arise for me once we'd left the ground, not major problems, just hassles. Earlier, when I disembarked from the boat, I'd foolishly left my adaptor and phone charger in the socket by the desk. This in itself was odd as once I had finished packing my suitcase I triple-checked everything to ensure that nothing had been left behind. I'd cleared security on the way out when I remembered and was fortunately allowed back on the ship to retrieve my stuff. My big mistake, which would affect things later on, was that I shoved my charger and adaptor into my suitcase, which I later checked in when I reached the airport. Sitting in Nordic Kitchen I noticed that I had 24% battery left so I switched off the phone to save power, but then I realised I'd need it to show my boarding pass at the gate. I went to switch on the phone and it simply wouldn't power up (remember, this is a fairly new iphone, it's about a year, possibly two years old and I certainly didn't expect it to start playing the tricks my other iphones have played, ie switching themselves off when the battery was low but not that low. Anyway, not only was I now unable to use my phone, I noticed that my watch was powering down too and will probably need a new battery. At the gate I managed to get the aforementioned printed boarding pass but I had no way of knowing what time it was and I couldn't charge my phone because the charger was in my suitcase which I'd checked in. Annoying how earlier actions, however small, come back to bite me when I least expect it.

Generally speaking the flight was fine, but all hell broke lose around an hour before landing in the UK, the plane being buffeted from side-to-side in the wind and rain. In the end I was used to it and it didn't bother me, but I was distracted enough not to read my book. Not having a watch that worked meant I had no idea how long there was to go before we landed. Normally when I fly I'm always looking at my watch and counting down the hours and the minutes until the pilot announces that the plane is about to descend into wherever I happen to be going, but this time I had no idea. There was a bald-headed man in front of me watching boxing on his iphone and I managed to spot the time, 2154hrs, meaning we'd been up for a couple of hours and had just under an hour to go. The severe weather, however, offered me no hints. I couldn't see for a start so I had to wait and let things unfold without me; I grinned and beared it all. Suddenly the captain made an announcement, but first he made it in Finnish and it seemed to take ages; then he spoke English and basically he was saying we would shortly begin our descent into London Heathrow. That normally means we're around 25 to 30 minutes away from landing. 

The plane slowly descended, rocking to and fro as it made its way towards terra firma. Eventually things calmed down. Then, the usual announcement that always baffles me. "Cabin crew, 10 minutes to landing" and it's normally at this point that I look out of the window and notice lights way way below me and I start thinking there's no way he's going to get all that way in just 10 minutes. Some times they do, other times, well, I can never remember if they ever do it in 10 minutes. Next time I'll time it.

Once on the ground the plane wound its way around the tarmac and eventually came to a standstill, but then all the passengers had to get off and get their bags out of the overhead lockers. It took an age and I had a minicab waiting for me. The problem now, of course, was that I couldn't call the driver until I'd retrieved my case from baggage reclaim, found the charger and charged the phone. This I did, sitting in a Caffe Nero and when the phone lit up I noticed many missed calls from an unknown mobile number, it was my minicab driver. I called him and we arranged a meeting place. Outside there was driving rain and shiny streets and pavements, and it continued all the way home on the M25. It had been raining all day and if I'm honest, I preferred the minus 14 degrees of Helsinki.

I reached home around 2300hrs, hit the sack around 2330hrs and now here I am, it's Friday morning and I've got the day off, the rain has stopped and I'm in the garden room blogging. 

Night boat to Helsinki, part two...

Last night's dinner in Bon Vivant (and yes, I still hate the name) was absolutely amazing and arguably the best meal I've eaten outside of my own house. I started with potato and oyster mushroom, but there was no mention of 'soup' and I was wondering exactly what I'd get. A jacket potato with mushrooms? Surely not. And no, it wasn't that, it was a soup, which was very tasty even if it didn't look that appetising. It had made the mistake of fine dining establishments in the UK from the early noughties onwards: that of serving up something that resembles gob. Or as fine dining establishments like to call it, foam. I hate it! And yes it does look as if somebody (the chef probably) has gobbed in a dish, added a bit of garnish and shouted 'Service!' But it tasted good. It tasted great but it wasn't particularly substantial. I've enjoyed better soups, put it that way, but still, it was good and that's all that matters. For my main course, I chose beef and plum and again the description was deceptive. What was I going to get? A piece of beef and a plum? Well, yes, I suppose, but it was much better than that: a huge slab of beef cooked to perfection with a very tasty slab of potato 'cake' on which was resting a large sprig of brocolli. Is that right? A sprig of brocolli? Anyway, it was the most amazing main course and I loved every bit of it, even if the waiter did arrive a few moments later to say he'd given me the wrong sauce (I hadn't noticed) and said it didn't matter a jot. I finished with a rice pudding dish – 'rice and gooseberry' – and it too was amazing, far better than I expected and easily the healthiest dessert on the menu. An alcohol-free Heineken and a large bottle of mineral water finished off the meal and I must say I sat there for a long time chilling as the ship steamed its way towards Helsinki.

Icy waters surrounding the port in Stockholm

After dinner there wasn't much to do unless I fancied the noisy cabaret act or the fruit machines in the casino. There's nothing worse than a casino, especially on a ship, because the reality is there are no 'high rollers' just chancers in ill-fitting clothes, you know the sort of person, they used to hog the pub fruit machine and knew far to much about when to 'nudge' and when to collect, always had pockets full of tokens jingling in their pockets. They're not James Bond, they're not George Clooney or anybody else who looks good in a dinner suit, they're just fools who will eventually lose whatever they win. Gambling, like drinking, is pointless. So with a toss-up of cabaret or casino I decided just to wander around. I checked my flight to London, added all the information the airline wanted to know and then put the finishing touches to yesterday's blogpost. It was soon time for bed, not that I really wanted to return to the barren cabin, but all the shops were closing for the night and it was almost 2300hrs. I lay on my bed, resting my head on the one pillow provided, and listened to the noises of the ship (which were mainly people flushing toilets in nearby cabins). 

Ice surrounds the ship

Outside it was dark and all that was visible was the bright white bow wave of the ship as it ploughed through the inky black sea. Eventually I fell asleep but I awoke around 0300 and by and large that was it, I never got back to sleep. I looked out every now and then and saw distant ships that I imagined were going back to Stockholm from Helsinki, but that was it. Prior to that moment (and probably much earlier on, possibly around midnight) I remember the ship slowing down. When I looked out of the window there were lights and a port and it reminded me of that scene in Apocalypse Now when Martin Sheen arrives in a strange, illuminated part of the jungle where the soldiers are dropping acid and I think Dennis Hopper turned up taking photographs. My memory of the movie is sketchy at best. I remember it being 0600 and 0700 and then I noticed that my watch was losing power, the battery needed to be replaced. 

Fast Lane restaurant...

At around 0800hrs I jumped into the shower. I wasn't expecting anything great, but it turned out to be the best shower of the trip, far better than the Birger Jarl hotel's offering. The space was cramped, however,  and the plug appeared to be blocked so the tray filled up and overflowed – but then I saw a plug on the floor and assumed it was a 'wet room', although that doesn't excuse the shower as there was a plug in the shower that clearly wasn't working. I decided not to shave, I just couldn't be bothered, and besides, I needed to get out of the cabin and down to breakfast in the Fast Lane restaurant. I'd imagine that Bon Vivant is closed and who wants a fine dining breakfast for heaven's sake, miniscule portions of food that should be piled high on the plate? Fast Lane was making big claims about its breakfast and to be fair it delivered on them. Porridge with berries and yoghurt fitted the bill nicely, throw in a pastry, a banana and a mint tea and I was in my element again. But then I wondered, when am I not in my element? Probably when I'm hungry. I kind of regret the pastry, but other than that all was well.

The view from cabin 9212, Thursday 8th February, 0800hrs.

The sea is flat calm and there's a mist that limits visibility. It's 0939 and there's about an hour to run. I'll need to get back to my cabin in order to pack stuff up and make ready to disembark. I must say I've enjoyed the ride, it's been a great night on the high seas and far better than being in a hotel, and I think I probably exaggerated the more unsavoury elements of the trip. It wasn't the ship's fault that one of its passengers decided to have a noisy shag and I suppose I ought to forgive the man in Fast Lane for belching, he was only human after all. 

The perfect main course...

Was it a party boat? Well, I suppose for some it probably was; there was certainly a lot of entertainment and with entertainment comes drinking so I'm guessing there are a few people with sore heads this morning wishing they didn't have to disembark, but in so many ways it was very civilised, far more civilised than it might have been if the ship was English. The passengers on the Silja Symphony were a little more sophisticated, considerably less lairy and drunk than their English counterparts. There's a mixed bunch here in Fast Lane this morning: a young family with a baby and their parents, the odd married couple, two kids playing on their own by the window, a man with a pony tail and beard playing with his iphone, a couple of slightly older people, probably married, a woman on her own, her case already packed and by her side, drinking tea, and many other variants of humanity going about the simple task of eating whatever they consider to be 'breakfast' be it a cup of tea or a bowl of porridge.

It's getting very close to the time when we disembark. Looking out of the window now I can see a lot of land, lots of snow and houses and hills and bare trees. We're in Finland that's a fact and it looks very cold and bleak, much bleaker than Stockholm so I'm glad I've brought the Russian hat with me and that I'm wearing a thick jumper and my UniQlo trousers, which are padded and warm. I'd better go, it's been good and I'd definitely do it again, that's a fact.

Minus 14 degrees in Helsinki...sea's frozen up

It's seriously cold out there, I thought as I surveyed the port area of Helsinki. My iphone said it was minus 14 degrees and the sea had frozen up. There were huge chunks of ice covering every inch of the sea and it was amazing how the boat managed to get through it all, but it did. Foolishly I had left my charger and adaptor in the cabin, which was mildly annoying as I'd spent a lot of time surveying the cabin for anything I might have left behind. I failed to check the power point. But no matter, I simply went back in and retrieved it and no time was lost.

Breakfast on the boat...

There was ice on the ground in Helsinki – a lot of ice – it was much, much colder than Stockholm and I had to be careful in case I slipped and fell. Fortunately I didn't fall and it was only a matter of time before I found myself at Helsinki airport after a brief meeting with a colleague. The check-in procedure was pretty straightforward and there was a queue for security, but it soon dwindled into nothing and eventually I was through and sitting in Nordic Kitchen where I ordered a salmon sandwich and some Fazer chocolate, not forgetting a mug of green tea. I might buy myself a bottle of water for the flight. Earlier, I ordered a cab to take me from London Heathrow to home (£79). That will save a gruelling journey with a suitcase on public transportation. I should be home by around 2200hrs.

I'm flying Finnair and if I remember correctly they hand out a small circular piece of chocolate in a red wrapper. I'll be looking forward to that. Having said that, I've had a couple of small bars of Fazer with my salmon sandwich in Nordic Kitchen so I don't want to be overdoing things. In fact, all this eating of rubbish simply has to stop, but I just can't resist it, especially if I'm hungry. I need to start swimming and upping the cycling as the weather warms up, but I can't keep talking, I must act.