Edinburgh -> Abu Dhabi -> Perth -> Adelaide
3 planes, 3 seats TO MYSELF on two planes, 4 SEATS (!!) to myself on my longest plane journey. Did I luck out or what?! I spent my long 10.5 hour flight lying across my entire row. As far as long journeys go, this was probably about as good as it was going to get!!
Until I convinced myself I was about to die. I’m fine on planes, but I do practically always think I am not going to survive the journey. Why this was the case on this journey:
- Turbulence – as soon as the seat-belt sign was turned on and everyone was requested to return to their seats I, each time, had a tiny inner freak-out. The turbulence wasn’t even bad.
- The sea. Too much sea. Just sea for HOURS. I kept convincing myself the plane would just go down. And no one would find us. And although I am a good swimmer I can’t exactly swim for thousands of miles, and it would be freezing, and I’d drown and freeze to death. I literally spent hours just willing the plane to be flying over land (of course, that wasn’t going to happen until we made it to Oz).
- People. About 6 hours in on my longest flight and I realised I had felt quite safe on the flight. The more I thought about this however the more I convinced myself I didn’t. To further push me from my state of ‘I can deal with this’, I noticed a few air hostesses gather around one of the toilets. They were knocking on the door, one of them picked up the phone and called someone explaining ‘someone is locked in the toilet’. My tiny inner freak-out grew. I was sitting just two rows away yet I could not hear anyone trying to get out of the toilet – neither trying the door nor talking back to the air hostess. So, in my head, someone was about to come out of that toilet and do something awful. I made myself lie back down with my iPod playing as the emptiness around me was freaking me out more (so many empty seats!). So, I did not see what happened or who eventually emerged, but someone did and obviously, there was nothing bad going on. But there could have been, and with the state of everything in the world right now, as ridiculous as I am for thinking this, you just never know who is around you, or what is about to happen. (It’s pretty unlikely there’s going to be an awful situation, but I over-think).
All in all, my free seats were BLISS. However, I did feel like I had a serious lack of company, although I’d rather be comfortable and deal with my ridiculous and annoying inner thoughts than spending over 20 hours sitting upright. Overall: WIN.
Quick recap of my Abu Dhabi airport time:
Abu Dhabi – what even? I bought 2 bottles of water for my flight to Perth, to have them taken straight off me. Who knew you couldn’t even take water on a flight (after being through security). I was SO CONFUSED and thought the guy was telling me I couldn’t take my backpack. So, I stared and kept asking ‘what why’ to then realise he meant my bag with water in. I was already running late for boarding my flight at this point – I was oblivious to the fact it had already been boarding for a while – as I’d been away buying the damn water. My boarding card then wouldn’t scan to let me through…. I don’t think the staff at this point were loving me.
Oh, and to top it all off – I only just realised about a week ago that Abu Dhabi is not Dubai. Yup, I thought they were the same place. I thought Abu Dhabi was IN Dubai. HOW DO I DO THIS. Now I know they are both in the United Arab Emirates. HOW DID I NOT KNOW THIS. What kind of traveller am I? (The ridiculous kind – did I really just admit I thought this?)
OZ:
I made it to Australia after MANY hours. I was confused by the fact I simply went through a passport machine – no one questioned me about my visa or anything. It all seemed too easy. I then eventually made it from Perth to Adelaide – again, confusion. I got off the plane to find families right there greeting each other. How were they there, through security, waiting at the gate we arrived into? I was too exhausted that my mind was baffled. Turns out that’s just a norm in Australia. Anyone can go through security whether getting on a plane or not, weird.
Alas, I got to Adelaide and had still not actually slept (despite having the closest thing to a bed I was going to get on the plane – 2 blankets, 3 pillows to go along with all my seats). Luckily it was 11pm so the perfect time to head straight to bed. One of my fave home gals was waiting for me when I arrived. <3 So, Australia, G’DAY!
