An event filled day, and it’s only lunchtime. I’m writing this in the airport lounge in Luxembourg, drinking a glass of the local bubbly (crémant) and eating a slice of clafoutis.
We almost didn’t make it here so I’m celebrating.
We spent our last morning in mainland Europe looking around more of the city.The area we explored was called Pfaffenthal, and is a largely residential area further along from the Grund.
You can walk down to it or take another elevator, which we did. You then make your way across the floor of the valley to the other side where you can take another elevator to a funicular. Well it was called a funicular but it was really a ridiculous set up. I don’t know how many millions of dollars they spent on it, but the distance covered is tiny. It would take you about two minutes to walk it.
These people honestly have too much money. All these rides were free as they count as public transport.
At the top we decided to try out the tram system. It’s so easy when you don’t have to pay, quick and simple. We just jumped on the next one going in our direction. We were only going to go one stop but I recognized the name of another stop further along that was very near our hotel so we stayed on until we got there.
Walking back to our hotel, Simon spotted a souvenir shop “Look! You can buy one of those Luxembourg cups you’ve been wanting!” How could I explain my initial reluctance? I couldn’t tell him I already had a mug because I’d stolen one from our hotel at breakfast; he’d be most disapproving. So I ended up going in, and now I have two cups from Luxembourg if anyone wants one. I just have to keep one hidden in my luggage for the next month.
Once we’d got back to our hotel we decided to head out to the airport early, even though our hotel had the usual very civilised standard European check out time of midday. There was no budging him from taking the taxi, in spite of the free bus that left for the airport every ten minutes from a stop just 450 metres away. He once said to me, I must tell him if he ever became as stubborn as his father. I’m just waiting for the right moment.
€50 later we were checking in. The process was super efficient, ten minutes after arrival we were through customs and waiting at the gate with two hours to spare. The only problem was, all the gates were called “A” and our tickets clearly said “B”. The gates were jam packed with people, we’d somehow missed the lounge and were going to have to squeeze in somewhere until our flight was boarding. But the gate thing kept nagging at me, so eventually we tracked down an information desk and asked what the situation was. It turns out we were in the completely wrong terminal. We had to turn around and go right back through customs, get our passports unstamped, go back through duty free and start again. Unbelievable. So weird to have to sneak back through one way doors, hoping not to set off alarms and get arrested. The customs man seemed only slightly annoyed, and we retraced our steps and have managed to find the lounge this time. Possibly in retrospect the taxi wasn’t a bad idea. Talk about tricks for young players, though! At least next time I pass through Luxembourg I’ll know.
We’ve just had a message that our flight has been delayed, our connection in Amsterdam is now only 20 minutes. I foresee more running around European airports getting frazzled in our near future. Nothing we can do about it now, though. Might as well sit back, relax and enjoy the hospitality.
….
Well, on the down side – we’ve missed our connection to Edinburgh. So, now we’re sitting in the lounge at Amsterdam Airport waiting for our next flight, and our arrival into Edinburgh has been delayed by four hours because we now have two more flights to go instead of one. On the plus side: we’re going to Paris!