Montréal 2025 3 - An Unexpected Journey

 I wrote this on Monday evening, and I'm just starting to catch up on things. Read on, dear reader.

Well, things didn't turn out as expected. Things changed. Going through final pre-boarding checks at Gate B38 the boarding pass reader flashed a worrying shade of red when I placed my boarding pass on it. Eek! I was politely invited to have the pass and my passport examined by a British Airways member of staff. "Well sir, I can tell you that your seat has been upgraded to Business Class. That's nice isn't it?"

Nice? It's a xxxxxxx miracle! Clutching my newly issued boarding pass I made my way down the ramp to the waiting Boeing 787, and was asked to turn left rather than right. At first I thought I might be sitting on the flight deck with the crew, not realising that there was a large cabin with individual seats there. Forgive my naivety.

I'm writing this at 00.36 British Summer Time, so that's a mere 22 hours since I rose from my bed. We're about 25 minutes from Montréal and should land on time at 20.15 local time. For the moment I'm going to rest my typing thumb and start again later, or even tomorrow morning. Je suis épuisé!

It's now Wednesday afternoon as I attempt to catch up. Please forgive my licence in borrowing a literary reference from J.R. Tolkien. It wasn't so much the journey that was unexpected, but the style in which it was accomplished, from the glass of champagne on arrival at my seat, to the "just a little snack" before landing at Pierre Trudeau International Airport. Once again I plead forgiveness from all of those who read this and are frequent business class flyers, and to whom this is the norm. I did previously get upgraded once on a flight from Paris to Montréal,  but this was a different experience altogether. 

A comfortable seat with room to stretch out my 1.84 m frame, and a rest for my size 46 feet was a total contrast to the cramped conditions on most flights I have taken. The food was presented well, on crockery plates, and not in  plastic or cardboard containers, and it tasted good too. The menu read like a tv advert for Marks and Spencer, you know what I mean. Allow me to quote from the menu (I took a photograph, but it appears that portrait format photos aren't liked by Blogger)

My starter was "Loch Fyne smoked salmon, hot smoked trout and poached prawn, served with a Pickled cucumber and fennel salad." My salivary glands are starting to work overtime just thinking about it.

Next came the Main Course; I chose the North Atlantic grilled cod, Bombay potatoes, five spiced broccoli, wilted spinach and a peppered tomato and coconut sauce.

For dessert I selected the Lemon meringue bar with raspberry. And very nice it was too!

I had opted for a glass of a cheeky little rose, but, and this was a shocking admission from the member of cabin staff,  they hadn't  "got the thing to take the top off." Shameful! What's the world coming to? Anyway, I had a pleasant glass of Sauvignon Blanc instead. 

I multitasked in that I ate my meal and watched a movie on the fold out screen at the same time. The film? Gladiator II. It was interesting, having paid my first visit to the Colosseum in Rome last July. There was a lot of blood and skulduggery, which went well with the peppered tomato and coconut sauce accompanying my North American cod. In fact anyone passing my seat might have thought gore had spilled out of the screen, as a not inconsiderate amount of the aforementioned sauce had been dropped on to the crisp white linen serviette.

The flight took 6 hours and 45 minutes and I always feel a frisson of excitement as the flight map first starts to display recognisable place names, places I have been fortunate to visit on previous adventures: Lake Temiscouata, Riviere du Loup, Québec City, Trois Rivières, Sherbrooke and yes, there it was  - Montréal. 

Here we are - at this point you are invited to turn your phone/computer upside down, or stand on your head. Perhaps I will have figured out how to edit the way Blogger chooses to present images before the next entry.

That's all for now, gentle reader. If you have enjoyed reading this, please add a comment. It's nice to know that  I'm not just writing this for myself. More soon - read about the landing in Montréal, first exploration of the trip in the city, and a concert which will require many superlatives to describe!

Montréal 2025 2 - Hanging about in Heathrow

It's  14.05 and that means just another 4 hours to go before the flight to Montréal. My six hours in Plaza Premium Lounge are over, and although they improved over the last couple of hours, with a slice of lemon cake and orange juice, followed at a respectable interval by a quite acceptable salad, I baulked at paying for extra hours. And so I ventured into the chaos of Terminal 5 proper. The place is heaving!  Having walked the length of the Terminal, (getting in the steps) and back,  I finally succumbed to a seat in Wetherspoons, and using my Wetherspoons app, had a pint of real ale delivered to my table. I think it was called Nick Heresy Bishop, but it has been a long day already, so I couldn't swear to it. A 4% pale ale, it was very palatable, even though, at £5.15, it wasn't the kind of Wetherspoons price that I'm familiar with. It looked a bit like this:

Shall I have another one? I believe the flight will be from the B gates, which entails a shuttle train ride from Terminal 5. That takes about 10 minutes, plus a 10 minute walk to catch the shuttle.  So let's say 30 minutes for an old guy carrying a backpack and guitar. That still leaves plenty of time for another pint, I would say. It may help me to sleep later. Readers of my past blogs may recall a kind of critic/commentator who often added his opinions when I was in full flow.  So far, nothing, so perhaps he has latched on to some other poor soul. It was at this point that I thought he may have added some acerbic comment. So far so good. OK, another pint it is - where's that app? It was "Nick Bishop Heresy", by the way. And it's now 14.48!!

Montreal 2025 - a new adventure commences!

Leaving my home at 3.30 a.m. isn't the easiest thing to do. First you have to wake up at 2.30 a.m., a feat in itself. Then the strangely unsettled hounds have to be allowed in the back garden to do what they normally do at 7.30 a.m. This having been accomplished without any canine commotion, more personal needs were attended to and a small, organic banana formed the first breakfast of the day. This was washed down with an energising shot of pulverised root ginger, with a tang of lemon juice. That, according to the label on the bottle, would set up my digestive system for the day. We'll see.
Final items were added to both hold and cabin baggage and the phone checked to verify that my Uber taxi was on its way to collect me. 

It still amuses me that I can watch the progress being made by the driver as he heads toward me.  Leaving the house is a difficult operation with four bits of luggage and two dogs intent on accompanying me. I sidled out and assembled the bags at the front gate.  

Loki the Magnificent, the five year old black labradoodle immediately appeared at the landing window, parting the vertical blinds with his head, with front paws on the window sill. In this pose he resembles the figure seen lumbering though a forest in North America  - our own Big Foot! Fleur makes herself known with the beginnings of a howl. At which point the blinds are moved further aside and my granddaughter Lucy appears, both to wave me off and to nullify the canine kerfuffle. The Uber taxi arrives five minutes late, having stopped for fuel at a petrol station a mile away  - information gathered from the tracking device in the car.

Baggage loaded, we left at 03.36 on the first stage of a journey which will take some 20 hours to complete.  Polite conversation ensued, and having discussed my final destination with the driver, I was slightly concerned that he thought it was now summer in Québec. Fortunately his sat-nav was sufficiently efficient to guide us to Newcastle International Airport, where we arrived at 04.01 - that's pretty good going!

Having checked in two bags I made my way to the security and hand baggage check. Newcastle Airport is blessed with the latest scanning technology, which allows  bags to be scanned without removing electronic devices etc. My guitar was another matter, however. Because it was fractionally too long to fit into the tray provided it had to be taken for personal examination and testing for explosive material. The nearest it has come to explosive material is when I played the accompaniment to "Damn Your Eyes" and unintentionally get faster and faster. Nevertheless it took careful examination by the agent, and a secondary examination by a supervisor before my Steinberg Spirit was returned to me. Tip: don't carry a spare set of guitar strings in the guitar case. Someone might think  you're going to garotte your fellow passengers!

[The photo above shows that Newcastle International Airport has moved to vertical,  rocket type take off for all aircraft. Either that or I couldn't rotate the image.]

Boarding the aircraft was painless, but the whole loading process was painfully slow. The aircraft was absolutely full, and everybody seemed to be carrying bags which were just within, or just over the limits for hand baggage. What of my guitar, I hear you say? Well, using all my charm, or grovelling shamelessly,  I asked if it could be carried in "the wardrobe".  Whether it was the charm or the base grovelling I don't know, but it worked!
The flight to London took just on 45 minutes, and we arrived at the stand at 07.20. Heathrow is a big airport, and sometimes it seems to take as long to taxi to the terminal as it does to fly there from Newcastle. Having duly collected my guitar on the way off, I made my way to the Flight Connection  area, which obviates the need to go through passport and security checks again. It hasn't always been so.
Knowing that I had a 10½ hour wait in Heathrow (I know, bad planning!) I had reserved a six hour slot in a premium lounge so made my way there, only to find an apologetic notice stating that, unfortunately,  the gentleman's toilets were not in operation! Shocking! You spend a pretty penny for luxury, then you can't spend a penny when you get there!
So, nature's needs having been satisfied, I returned to the Plaza Premium Lounge, and was guided to a vacant armchair by a member of staff. Lounge access also provides for 'free' food, so I decided to break my healthy breakfast routine and have some scrambled eggs  with fried tomatoes, a sausage and two pieces of bacon. Sadly the coffee machine was not operating at the time (!!) so I was unable to minimise the taste of the foulest breakfast I've had for a long while. Everything was stone cold, the sausage virtually tasteless and the bacon tough as tough could be.  It's going to be a long six hours in here, but on the bright side Wetherspoons is only 50 metres away!
More later...