Up, Up and Away!
A 9pm flight is both a blessing and a curse. You have plenty of time to pack and get ready but having finally reached “Take-Off Day”, it’s such a long anticipation-filled wait for it all to begin. Ross & I both spent the morning packing and then I used the next few hours to suddenly remember things I’d forgotten to pack, and then attempt to cram them into all four corners of my jumbo bag. The business of suddenly remembering things I’d forgotten to pack, reached a crescendo when, not too long after we’d left home and were barrelling down the Wakehurst Parkway, Ross casually (and very fortuitously it turns out) enquired whether I had my passport. I responded with an “actually…no”, followed by an “OH-MY-GOSH! HOW THE HECK COULD I HAVE FORGOTTEN MY PASSPORT?!” Did Ross have his? Of course he did. It’s international travel 101. We turned around and headed for home where Tobes met us in the driveway to make the hand-over so Molly could kindly continue the process of delivering us safely to the airport - crisis averted.
Sydney Airport was jam-packed with travellers; queues to get through customs winding for miles. All I desperately wanted to do was make some jokes about bombs but there was a huge flashing sign above us declaring that: ‘Jokes about bombs in airports are not funny’. Well that’s annoying.
By the time we eventually boarded our plane - by now, experts in the art of queuing - Rossco had inadvertently clocked nearly every one of our seated fellow-passengers in the head with his wayward neck pillow, attached to his backpack on a jaunty angle at just the perfect head-height, as he sauntered down the aisle to his seat. Once I’d pointed it out (and had indeed myself been a victim of the said pillow-slap) he employed an ingenious sideways shuffle for which the surrounding, yet-to-be-harmed-passengers were grateful. Unfortunately, later in the flight his assault continued when his full stainless steel drinkbottle launched as a projectile from the overhead locker; the startled passenger in the firing line declaring she had been hit in the head.
Rossco and I were seated across the aisle from one another, both enjoying an aisle seat and Ross had legroom to burn. My row buddies were from Brazil and Hungary respectively and we got into a nice synch, all getting up together to go to the bathroom at the same time.
At about 4am, they shocked us into consciousness by turning every light in the plane on at once. As the food cart came thundering past the multitude of bewildered, eye-rubbing passengers, we all wondered what meal of the day we had been roused for. Was it an extra early brekkie, a late, late dinner? Who knew? Being asked if we’d like a chicken sandwich, (which incidentally was masquerading as a beef meat pie) we can only assume it was a misplaced lunch?
With a few hours’ sleep under our belts and what seemed like way too much food in our bellies, we disembarked amidst the glitz and glamour of Doha Airport and waited for our flight for Athens. Disappointingly, we were delayed by 40 minutes, eating into the time we’d allowed between our next connecting flight to Corfu. Knowing it would be tight when we got to Athens, we literally hit the ground running. Turning up at the Information desk, puffing and red-faced, the calm lady behind the counter told me to take a deep breath, pull myself together and listen carefully…”I vill say zis only once”.
We ran to the check-in gate, presenting ourselves to the flight representative in an even more heightened state of flusteredness (if that’s a word) than at the previous counter. She looked at our flight time and launched into action. It turns out our 35kg luggage allowance on our flight from Sydney wasn’t too compatible with the 15kg limit allowance on our little propeller plane to Corfu. We knew we’d have to pay extra for our luggage but we didn’t bank on the distance between the check-in counter and the extra-baggage payment counter. Oh the red tape! She looked at Ross and, with pointed finger towards a counter so far in the distance it couldn’t be seen with the naked eye, implored him to:”RUN!!” And run he did! All those laps around Narrabeen Lake had paid off and he was in fine form, paying the bag fee and returning to get our boarding passes just in the nick of time. Again, the same petite woman behind the counter roared: “RUN!!” (Her thick Greek accent and face mask didn’t hinder the message getting through). Just as we heard our names being paged over the loud speaker - through the whole airport, which is always fun - we set off in full flight, Ross running, me jogging (& wishing I wasn’t wearing sandals), face masks on and hefty backpacks in tow, towards customs. Waving his boarding pass, Ross asked a kind customs official if we could skip the queue. He whipped out his phone, took one look at the time and said “go, go, go!” Amidst the frenzied rush of pulling out laptops and liquids, Ross realised he still had a drinkbottle filled with water. The customs lady said she had nowhere to pour it out and that Ross would have to drink it. He was doing a good impression of the Solo man, water sloshing down his chin, when she took pity on us and waved us through. After another desperate sprint, we finally made it to the gate and were ushered on, sweating and panting like puppies, to face a busload of impatient, crammed-in passengers that we had been responsible for holding up. A few disgruntled sighs were heard and whispers in Greek I’m glad I couldn’t translate. (I was hoping for applause after that effort!).
Meanwhile, our good friends Al and Michelle, who had already been holidaying in Europe and were heading home, had arrived in Athens via bus and were still in the airport! If our flight had been on time we could’ve met them for a drink. How frustrating! They even heard our names being paged. I’m sure we probably jogged right past them. Missed them by that much.
By the time we were seated on our propeller plane to Corfu, we were a sweaty mess. Apart from a slight incident where my backpack nearly bowled the flight attendant over, we were almost there,…
Our Airbnb host had left a simple message, ‘meet me at the Black Cat Cafe where we will rendezvous’. It sounded like something from a James Bond movie. It turned out there were actually 2 Black Cat Cafes so we picked one and had a refreshing ale while we waited for Gina to take us to our accommodation - a 100 year-old building, down a tiny alleyway, completely refurbished on the inside. It’s just beautiful & right in the heart of the old town.
Corfu is just gorgeous! We were struck with the beauty and rustic charm of the stoic old buildings with peeling paint and shuttered windows, romantic paved alleyways and window boxes brimming with bright geraniums. Souvenir shops and restaurants with outdoor tables lined the narrow lanes, with washing strung up in inventive ways from open windows everywhere you looked.
Our wonderful wander around the Old Town culminated in a scrumptious Greek meal at a restaurant called Rex (thanks for the recommendation Em!) which we virtually had to ourselves at 7pm. Our sidewalk table was the perfect place to take in our incredible surroundings, watch passers by and soak in the atmosphere of the warm night. Eventually our eyelids could stand it no more and by 8:30, when the action in the Old Town was just starting to heat up, we were tucked up and snoozing. What a day!
