Journey’s End

It was a very long day. We had to be in the lobby at 7:00 AM for the private car to pick us up for the ride to Heathrow. We had lots of baggage. I had 4 suitcases plus a backpack and a tote bag. I was carrying a heavy load. Our check in at Heathrow was without human contact. We went to an area with a conveyor, scanned the boarding pass, got the luggage tag printed, put it on the suitcase and sent it on its way. I did that for each bag. We had a luggage cart to carry the rest of the bags to the security screening. We didn’t have to wait too long in line to get through security, then made our way to the British Air lounge. We had 2 1/2 hours to wait. We got some breakfast and waited to go to the gate. It took several minutes to get to the gate, after a very crowded train shuttle ride. It was finally time to board. For a change, we were directed to the left, not the right when we got on. Business class is pretty plush. We had our own little cubby with lots of leg room and a seat that goes flat. I had my last meals that will be served to me. Now I’m back to cooking for one.
‘We had the usual boring flight. I watched a couple movies, then tried to get some sleep. I must have slept because the next time I looked at my watch, it was a couple hours later. We had another small meal before we landed.
We had to wait while some cargo was unloaded. Then we made our way to Immigration. It was such a pleasure to go through to the kiosk for the Trusted Traveler. All we did was scan passport, look at the camera and we were on our way. We collected all the luggage and went to the curb to wait for our ride. Phil got there within 5 minutes and we were on our way. Glad it’s Saturday with less traffic. We were home by 5:00.
‘It was a wonderful trip. We saw many places we never dreamed we’d get to see and surprised ourselves at our resilience. We are pretty wiped out but we have so many great memories and made some good friends. I’m glad I did it but I won’t be doing it again. There were people on the ship who’d been on multiple world cruises. Not for me. Other than going to Lake Geneva, I won’t be traveling for a while.
‘If anyone is thinking of a cruise of any length, I highly recommend Viking. The staff is very helpful and friendly. The ships are very well designed and not too big. This will be my last post. I’m hoping I can find a way to permanently save all the posts.
‘Photos: The Tower of London, 2 shots, one of the cars, me on top of the world, the restaurant where we ate last night, and finally the two of us at LAX. We logged 42,671 miles. That’s a lot of mileage! Farewell my friends.