SoloTravel with white hair

I'm a solo traveller and I have white hair. What does this mean? It means that airport security staff view me as senile- well some of them anyway - and are mildly surprised when I hop into that xray thinggy and assure them that I have only my (big) handbag and no I don't have any liquids or anything liquidy or explosive in there 'cos I did a bag drop with all that stuff in my suitcase - well apart from the explosives bit obviously.

At passport control I use the automatic gates. Very often a kind airport staff member will take my passport and present it for me and usher me through that gate like a reluctant greyhound into the traps. So I smile and say thank you even though I am quite used to doing this myself. 

On arrival at the airport, all friendly help dissolves as soon as my feet hit the tarmac. It's find the carousel with your luggage yourself and haul it off the belt as quickly as possible and don't get in the way of other travellers and their hundreds of heavy suitcases. Then a quick visit to the toilet and then it's find the exit for taxis. 

It's great being a solo traveller and doing it all myself. Don't get me wrong, I am grateful for any help offered. I love every minute.

I'm just planning my next trip.

Easy Travel - A not-so-serious look at fellow travellers

I beg to differ from William Shakespeare, it is not misery that acquaints us with strange bedfellows; it is travel, air travel to be exact.

Waiting at the gate in Dublin for my flight to Frankfurt, I take stock of my fellow voyagers. There are the hikers, struggling under the weight of bulging backpacks and bumping into everyone, there are the seasoned ones, who have done it all before and who remain calm and collected. And there are the get-the-best tourists, as I call them. The ones who keep a hawk eye out for any movement that suggests we might be boarding soon. As soon as the airline clerk appears, they are off at a gallop to stand in the queue, waving boarding cards and straining to get on board before everyone else.

Once on board, you get the “stow your hand luggage brigade”. You stand patiently waiting in the aircraft aisle to get past and claim your seat in the hope that the overhead locker isn’t going to crumble under the weight of what has already been forced in there. But just when you are about to ease past, they suddenly remember that they need something out of that backpack and so haul it back down, narrowly avoiding your head. Then, it’s rummage time, because whatever they are looking for, it’s going to be down at the bottom of that capacious bag. Behind you a few passengers murmur politely in protest and blame the delay on you. 

Finally, you are seated and you have found a niche for your carry on bag – not without difficulty and quite a bit away from your seat, but hey, who wants to be difficult? Now you can relax and watch the safety drill and fasten your seat belt. Once airborne, you’ll notice “the bouncer”: the passenger in the seat in front of you who tries very hard to convert his seat into a day bed (sorry, but it is usually a male in my experience). Any minute now you feel that his head is going to land in your lap.

If you are unlucky enough to have handed in your luggage to be stowed, you will experience the adventure of the luggage carousel and the “is this my suitcase?” brigade. A friend of mine recounts seeing a man walking off with her suitcase, even though it had a huge pink ribbon attached to the handles so that she could identify it more easily. When accosted, he looked very annoyed. “Where’s my suitcase, then?” he bellowed at her. She almost surrendered her piece of luggage to him in sheer fright.

Should you decide to have a snack and a coffee/tea, you will discover that, if you are sitting in the aisle seat (as I usually am), the passenger in the window seat will choose the exact moment you get your steaming cup of beverage to decide he/she needs to visit the toilet.  Then comes the excitement of folding up the little table while balancing your hot cup of tea/coffee and trying not to spill anything as they push past.

Just when I think I should stop smiling politely and show a touch of exasperation, I remind myself that it is our fellow passengers who make travelling such a unique experience, one I wouldn’t miss for the world.

Bon Voyage!

Return from the Continent

It's great to get away and visit family but it is also wonderful to arrive home safe and sound.
I am just back from nearly a month in Germany. It was very hot - too hot for my liking - most of the time. Lots of thunderstorms, which I enjoy. 
The journey there and back always involves a day's travel. I suppose I shouldn't complain (well actually I'm not complaining, just commenting) because in the days of Jane Austen, the trip would have taken nearly a week. And - staying with Jane Austen, in her novel Persuasion, the heroine notes that matters which were of first importance in one village are of little interest in the neighbouring one, remarking that we should know our own insignificance beyond our own circle. I find this to be the case when I travel from one country to another (perhaps not surprisingly).
My return journey made me think about what travel would have been like two hundred years ago. Boarding in Frankfurt was nearly an hour before scheduled take-off. Once the information on the departure gate was up, off I went. I half expected to see the lights of Dublin since I must have walked miles. I survived the passport check and the hand luggage scrutiny, and even though the scanner did not even so much as hiccup, the grim faced lady on the other side still patted me down, or maybe she liked my capri pants and wanted to check what the material was.... Everyone squeezed onto an airport bus which drove us out to the aircraft. I always maintain that the Aer Lingus airplanes are parked out near the refuse bins. The journey out there is interesting if you like observing traffic at airports. I had had the presence of mind to claim a seat near the rear of the aircraft so managed to get to it without having to wait for those wonderful passengers who root around in their carry-on bags and hold everyone up.The flight was fine. When we got to Dublin, it was another long walk to get to the exit with lots of stairs, which made me wonder what happens if you are a bit shaky on your feet but not ready for wheelchair transport. Next, I took a bus to the railway station (one hour) and from there a train (nearly three hours) and then another bus which should have taken fifty minutes but took well over an hour because of traffic.
Home never looked so good when I finally closed the door behind me. But it was worth it all and anyway, I enjoy travelling. There is the whiff of adventure and glamour, despite all the checks and delays. No matter how often I travel, I still find something new to surprise me.
If you are travelling for your holidays, I hope you have fun!

A Tech-free Trip - well, almost!

It was only when I got to Dublin airport and decided to check for messages that I realised I had left my mobile phone at home. Horror of horrors! As I was arriving late, I planned on going straight to my hotel in Frankfurt city centre and sending my daughter a text to say I had arrived safely and make plans for meeting next morning. There's always the internet, I consoled myself.  However, my gmail account wasn't having any of this nonsense. I was not at my usual pc and they wanted answers to questions such as "when did you create your account with gmail?"  They also wanted me to check my mobile. Grrrr...  I had one mobile phone number written into my little diary which I had - with more luck than intelligence - packed into my shoulder bag. I accosted a handsome young man (!!) and asked if I could send a text on his phone. Ole, if you ever read this, please accept my thanks again, you saved my life!  I sent off a text to my son explaining what had happened and gave my hotel phone number. 
It all worked beautifully. My daughter got my message and phoned me at my hotel and we made arrangements of when and where to meet.  And so the whole week went.  I met some former colleagues, having already arranged the time and place before I left Ireland, so no hassle there. Everything went smoothly simply because there was no way of making last minute changes or sending texts to say "I'll be half an hour late". 

I can't say it was liberating, especially at the beginning, because the urge for instant communication has been drilled into us by the mobile communications people. But by the end of my stay I was completely used to being without my phone. Being without your mobile simply makes you a better communicator!  Instead of "I'll send you a text" you have to say something like "we'll meet at the town hall tomorrow at 2 p.m." and then you have to be there.  You can't take photos of anything and everything at will, you just have to relax and enjoy the moment.  And you have to ask and read notices in order to find things out as you can't simply google it.

No. I have not thrown my phone away and I have done some texting this morning already.  But at least I now know that I don't need it absolutely to survive in the communications jungle.  It's a cheering thought.

Finally, I read an article on the BBC's website.  It is a true and tragic story of a family who left home without mobiles or credit cards and although they were always near major cities and towns, they were practically untraceable. They literally disappeared off the radar.  Makes you think.
Here's the link:

the mystery of a tech-free road trip in Australia

The Lure of Travel

I wonder why we all like to travel so much?  For us here in Ireland I expect it is the prospect of a week or two of sunshine, our summers being somewhat unpredictable.  The whole procedure of getting our bodies  from home to Sunny Destination X has become so routine that many of us don't give it a second thought.  The journey to the airport, checking in, finding the departure gate, doing a bit of shopping at the duty free, we do it all as a matter of course.
I must admit I am a fidgety traveller, always afraid something will go wrong and I'll miss my flight.  I can only relax once I have sunk down on one of those hard plastic seats at the departure gate with my boarding pass clutched in my sweaty palm.
Which is why my recent coach trip to Northern Ireland was a welcome change. We toured Belfast, including the Titanic Interpretation Centre and drove all along the coast to visit The Giant's Causeway (breathtaking), the Glens of Antrim (equally gob-smacking), Doagh famine village, Malin Head (the most northerly point in Ireland), the city of Derry and the Cathedral in Armagh.  An unforgettable trip. I went with a ladies' club of which I am a member and everything was organised.  What bliss.  I didn't have to rummage in my bag for a single thing nor study a map nor negotiate narrow roads!  And we had glorious weather so that half the time we were wandering about in warm sunshine!   We stayed at a different hotel every night, our coach awaited us straight after breakfast and off we went to see the sights.  Northern Ireland is a beautiful part of the world.   Barbara Ferguson our guide and proprietor of  Guided Tours Ireland 
 did a truly wonderful job in helping us understand and enjoy the places we visited. I won't go into detail of the trip because guide books and tour guides like Barbara do a much better job to make it all come alive.
Here are a few photos though - my camera is a very simple one so no majestic panoramas.

This is a view from Malin Head. We had glorious weather for the entire trip.

This is the view from Doagh Island famine village.  We didn't have time to explore that long golden strand.  The visit to the famine village centre was one of the highlights of the trip. 

I think we all fell in love with the city of Derry - here is a view of the Peace Bridge.
 
All in all a wonderful experience.

Strange Bedfellows

'Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows' Shakespeare once wrote and I'm inclined to agree with him, only I'd change the word 'misery' to 'travel'. 

Last week I travelled to Germany to see my daughter and her family and had a wonderful time.  Dare I mention that the weather was glorious? At 26C a lot of the locals were complaining about the sudden heat as it had gone from around 8C to the aforementioned 26C within five days.  Now in rain-laden Ireland, that would be a cause for rejoicing because we'd know that this was better than it gets!  But I didn't intend writing this blog about the weather.

Whenever I travel anywhere by plane, I am always amused - and sometimes irritated - by all those fellow travellers with tons of hand luggage who fill up the overhead lockers before you can say "jet lag".  It wouldn't even be so bad if they didn't get on the plane before you and stand in the aisle stuffing their bags into the lockers while you wait until they are finished, ignoring the passengers behind you who are breathing heavily down the back of your neck and no doubt blaming you for the hold up.  And then when you finally get to move on in search of your seat another body pops up to block your progress, takes down a bag and starts to rummage through it.  I mean, seriously, couldn't you check that you'd removed magazines and stuff you need on the flight from your bag before you jammed it into the overhead locker?

And then there's the 'snoozer' for want of a better word, the traveller who decides to use their seat as a recliner and bounce around on it, making you draw back instinctively and sit bolt upright. Maybe they miss lounging on the terrace at home.  Whatever the reason, it doesn't give you much room in the Economy class.  And of course, there's the passenger who manages to dig his/her knees into your back - but here they are entitled to my compassion and understanding because there is really not much leg room if you are tall.

Being a neurotic traveller (see my blog of last week lol) I always choose an aisle seat so that I can get out in a hurry if anything should go wrong.  No one has ever had a problem with this up until now, everyone being happy to sit in a window seat and philosophical  if they get the middle one.  However, on this last trip a passenger arriving late onto the plane wanted to shush me into the window seat (which was his) without as much as a "would you mind?".  I couldn't tell if this was chivalry, a determination not to disturb me, or a macho masterful attempt to get the seat he preferred.  I refused, of course.  I'm not a neurotic traveller for nothing.  There was a frosty atmosphere between us for the flight and we both refrained from dumping our magazines and stuff on the unoccupied middle seat, treating it as a demilitarized zone like the 38 parallel in Korea.  I'd just like to add that he had two pieces of hand luggage.  'Nuff said.