the adventure begins. right out of the starting gate as well, or airport gate that is. toronto is a nice 45min flying time after all your check in and security and waiting around inside of an hour etc. so what happens when the toronto airport closes down for and hour due to heavy cross winds in a thunderstorm? you first circle toronto for 45 minutes while you wait for clearance to land on the one and only runway open. then once you get cleared you start back to toronto. 15 mins later you get canceled on your approach and you have to head back to ottawa to get more fuel and wait trapped in the plane for an hour on the de-icing tarmac. lots of free snacks and orange juice and pop while watching episodes of entourage on the in flight entertainment units, your plane gets fuel and off you are again to toronto. holding pattern again while you wait your turn to land on the only runway open still and your down. four hours in air flight time plus 1 hour or so on ground means a nice delay. it also means you miss your original connection in toronto to london.

off the plane in toronto, checked with the ground crew on connection status, seems all good, just need a new boarding pass for a later flight. off to the customer service desk, and time to wait in a line. then anyone looking for international re-bookings was told they had to go up the stair and out through security and to the other side of the terminal to get in line for international check-in with everyone else whose trying to check in for the last flight out. those of us from ottawa looking for just a pass for a plane that leaves in an hour and security to go though again. so a little talking an convincing later all of us with already checked baggage get our own line and dude to check us in at lightning speed. running off to security, getting though there at a decent speed, then running through the terminal to the gate. get there double check that its the right flight and that there is a seat, then being told its going to be an hour more till boarding since their going to wait for the rest of the connections delayed due to the hour close down earlier. so all that stress and running around for nothing. time for some water and sugar and chilling on the floor. on the flight and ready to go. 7 hours in the air, 3 hours of sleep on the plane, 6 hours delayed. landed in london at noon london time, 7 ottawa time.

was lucky to be at the front of the plane so getting off was fast and meant i had no customs line to wait in, 5 questions later, and i’m through in 3 mins. getting my bags was the same. 10 mins or less i had both bags and was off to find the tube station, a good 30 min stroll away on moving floors. got my tube 7 day oyster pass and onto the tube i went. 2 hours later was across london an in brads hood. my cell phone wasn’t working cause there is no cdma network in the uk, and had no coins yet. found a red booth with a card slot, brad came and found me and then it was coffee and beer time. that was a damn long ass day.