Grenada to London.

We are definitely not the first, nor will we be the last, but wow, that was a long time to be on a runway. Our departure from Grenada was going smoothly, we had our last Carib, said our goodbyes, waltzed through security, and stood around the steaming airport waiting to board our plane.

 

I was mildly excited for the flight seeing as it was our first time flying Virgin Atlantic, however, the excitement dwindled as each hour passed sitting on the runway. One… Two… Three… The cause of the three hour delay was a tire. I don’t exactly know what was wrong with the tire, but ground crew said it was necessary it be changed. I trusted their judgement. Therefore, I didn’t really have a problem waiting and frankly, I would rather wait on the air conditioned plane with snacks being served and in-flight entertainment at my disposal. However, three hours is loooong. Especially when your flight time is already ten hours.

We finally took off for our short stop in St . Lucia to change crew and pick up some more Brits, however, nothing about the stop was short. As the plane loaded and we disembarked from the gate we stopped. Over the mic we’re told that we “have to pull back to the gate due to a passenger suffering a medical emergency”. We’re pretty sure someone was having a heart attack based on the defibrillator and the crews reaction but that remains unconfirmed. All the best to the affected person.

So another hour and a half was spent sitting on the St. Lucia runway. Four hours of sitting on runways. Luckily, we only had a short trip across the Atlantic in our future. Ugh. But regardless, we kept cool and calm. No use in complaining about things out of our control. Our flight wasn’t get cancelled, we didn’t get stranded, and we weren’t suffering from a medical emergency in a foreign land. Plus, I finally got to watch Gone Girl (not nearly as good as the book).

When we finally arrived at London-Gatwick it was time to get downtown. In a zombie-like state we meandered through the tube and streets to arrive at our hotel:

The rest of our day was fairly uneventful due to lack of sleep. We had our first pint (yeah!), wandered around our adopted ‘hood, and counted the minutes until we could go to bed.

We made it to 8pm. We’d conquer the city in the morning.