Day 9: They say travel broadens the mind

The G writes (and I agree with her):

“We leave India grateful to the Spirit House for its management of this tour and for creating an itinerary that was engaging and interesting. It is their brand and what it stands for that attracted a vibrant and like-minded travel group and the perfect team leader Skipper Damien (ably assisted by his wife Sandie who came along as a participant).

“The tour mantra of “safe food and clean toilets” was consistently realised over seven jam-packed days of adventure and new experiences.

“The pace was full-on with amazing street scenes, awesome architecture, exposure to the culture, the colour and the spice of India and lots of laughter

“From our limited exposure to India it seems to be a country that lives in chaotic harmony blending its different religions which like the electrical cabling in the streets just seems to work.

“We take with us a respect for the people of India, a greater appreciation of our privileged lifestyle and a quest to blend spices perfectly, to explore the “curd” further and to find an Aussie potato that delivers the spice and texture that we enjoyed so much each day. If this is a small taste of the North then we can only imagine what lies in the South

“To our fellow travellers Anne and Kevin, Pam and Matthew, Janne and Jaqui thank you for your great company and for making a great holiday even better.”

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The result or outcome of travelling may broaden the mind but the act of it certainly does not. Unless of course you count watching innumerably movies of varying filmic qualities as being mind-broadening.

Today we did the Delhi to London flight. I am at a loss to know why we did not fly business – perhaps it was because in the comfort of your own home when you make these decisions you don’t imagine the discomfort of the flight at the back of the bus. Our flight was the worse for being routed through Abu Dhabi so we had to get off and fiddle around with transit and more security checking than with a direct flight.

It was "goodbye" to the Visaya Hotel. Satisfactory but not salubrious.

We were up at the crack of dawn (in fact before dawn at 0530) and into a cab at 0600. The cabbie was keen to improve his English which, while it was certainly better than my Hindu (which is non-existent) was not easily comprehensible. On such occasions I leave the banter to The G who has infinite resources of a thing called patience. I do know where you find patience; I never have found it in any useful quantity though I cannot say I have looked very hard.

We had to show passports and itinerary even to get into the terminal. We were flying Etihad which not a One World member so I had no status so we had stand in a bloody great queue. There was more security checking opening of passports and stamping of boarding cards than I could count.

Eventually we arrived at our gate and hung around until the flight was called. Well, it wasn’t called because Delhi is a silent airport. It’s about the only thing that is silent in Delhi: certainly you would be on a loser trying to stop drivers from blowing their horns incessantly. No air con in the terminal probably because they think it's winter!

As we queued we heard a man on phone saying in English in that beautiful clipped Indian accent "I'm not better than reasonably convinced...". He presumably had a scale of conviction and “no better than reasonably convinced” sits somewhere on that scale.

The Delhi to Abu Dhabi flight was OK at about 3½ hours. I watched a movie called 99 Homes. Not exactly great film and not particularly good entertainment either.  I think we were almost the only Westerners on the flight. It’s a long time since I've experienced that but it brings to mind a China Southern flight from Bangkok to Beijing many years ago when I shared the business class cabin with a handful of Chinamen drinking brandy and a load of empty seats.

Mysteriously there was always 38 minutes of flying time left. And the information about the departure gate for our next flight was wrong. Harumph.

There was a moment of excitement during our descent into Abu Dhabi when high-pitched voices erupted behind us. There were shouts of "emergency" and the attendants rushed to the back. A woman appeared to be protesting that a man had touched her inappropriately. It was all over as soon as it had begun.

An airport departure lounge. Ugh.

Fortuately we did not have long to skull around Abu Dhabi airport. All airports are the same. In a word, deadly. There just is no such things as a good airport. The next leg to London was predictably boring but possibly not as boring as reading this blog. I watched the James Bond movie which was also boring; did it have a discernible plot? I am sure I cannot say. Am I just getting old and boring myself? Who can tell?

We hit the immigration queue at Heathrow and of course I did not know that because I enter the UK on my British passport that we could have gone through the EU channel and cut our waiting time down my many tens of minutes.

We clambered on a the tube from Heathrow but cocked it up by getting off at Barons Court when we should have gone on to St James Court. I lugged those bloody bags up and down more stairs that I care to recall but we got to Westminster Mansions where we are staying eventually. Out host Eric greeted us; he is a lively and likeable fellow.

Westminster Mansions: home for the next three nights. Turned out to have a very comfortable bed.

Our one bedroom apartment is on the fourth floor with a view (just) to Westminster Abbey and Big Ben. The G had said the Big Ben was down for maintenance but we heard it donging softly. As my Father used to ask “what smells and rings like a bell?” The answer is “dunnnggg”.

I had better leave you with that thought.