June 10th, 2011: a typically beautiful day in San Diego, California. The first leg of our flight to Amsterdam is British Airway’s newly inaugurated non-stop from San Diego to London’s Heathrow Airport. Our flight departs at 8:05 pm arriving in London at 2:05 pm on the 11th.
With the entire day at our disposal, we found no reason to rush. There was plenty of time for breakfast, showers, and last minute errands. I packed and re-packed my camera gear…..I wanted to take as little as I could but I didn’t want to be handicapped for the lack of the right gear as well as my desire for spares. In the end I packed 2 DSLRs, (one converted to IR), 1 compact, waterproof/shockproof aps sized digital, and 4 fast lenses: a wide-angle, a 28-300/macro zoom, a 70-200 zoom, a 28-75 “inside” zoom, my lensbabies, a 2x tele-adapter, half a dozen various filters, a flash, remote triggers, cleaning gear, battery chargers and my tripod. Add to that my laptop, a 2GB outboard drive, wacom tablet and spyder 3 color control system and that’s my kit. Oh yeah….I almost forgot….I brought some clothes, too.
Anyway, as we packed and remembered all the little stuff that we’d forgotten to remember I was struck by how much easier it is to leave in the evening than it is to leave first thing in the a.m. There was virtually no muss and no fuss.
We got to the airport more than 2 hours before our flight…checked through security, sat down in one of the lounges and split a beer and an order of fries. When our flight was called we just strolled on board, stowed our gear, sat in seats ‘a’ and ‘c’ with an empty ‘b’ between us and kept our fingers crossed.
Alas, it was not to be. The flight was full and the 3d seat in our row was needed by another. BJ scooted over to the middle seat, the plane pushed back and we were off.
We flew in a Boeing 777 which, despite being such a recent model (the 777 has been flying only since ’94), was certainly designed by the descendants of the Marquis de Sade! Or, in this case, by their computers! The wide-body 10-across seating isn’t so bad by itself but BA has crammed every seat into this bird that it can use without necessitating the addition of an in-flight orthopedic surgeon.
Three college-aged blondes occupied the row in front of us and at their earliest opportunity reclined their seats, (why is it that college-aged blondes always seem to want to recline?…)and why aren’t I still young enough to care?))…well, that put our side of their seats about 14 inches from the far side of our noses….where they remained for the next ten-and-a-half-hours.
The food was…ok, (I’m old enough to remember when airlines served 5-star food on fine china with real silverware and crystal glasses….oh for the good old days). However, at least drinks were free and movies were recent and plentiful…screened at my convenience on the 9-inch screen built into the back of the seat now 14” from my face…..close enough that I had to wear my glasses to watch (and I did so, all the while covertly hoping that the video player was generating enough heat to make the blonde uncomfortable).
Overall, I guess there was nothing really wrong with that flight…..we did, at one point, hit some brutal turbulence, but it only lasted a few moments and the rest of the flight was like silk…so no real complaints.
Saturday the 11th we landed at Heathrow around 2:15 p.m. (Here comes the part where we demonstrate some intelligence) We gathered our gear, cleared customs and caught a cab for the Heathrow Marriot. An hour and a couple of showers later found us strolling hand-in-hand through a lovely little neighborhood in search of the local pub.
The Pheasant Pub was a very nice little bar & grill less than 2k from the Marriot. We had a light and leisurely dinner of ‘pub grub’, knocked down a couple of drinks and strolled back to the hotel. Once there we spent a little time at the bar talking to other travelers (BJ swears that Keenau Reeves was at the bar….but I didn’t see him) and then went into the hotel restaurant to have a little dessert.
There we met a lovely Welsh couple who were celebrating their 54th wedding anniversary. Pat and Mary were retired, of course, and were enjoying their remaining years by following the Welsh Football (Rugby) team from city to city and country to country enjoying the matches and the camaraderie of other fans. Pat stipulated that at Rugby matches, unlike soccer and some other sports, opposing fans were not at all enemies. Nor were grudges kept. After a match, the fans all shook hands with one another, offered congratulation or condolences as appropriate, then went off together for a beer and some food.
We asked if they’d ever been to America upon which they explained that they’d been to the US a couple of years ago watching an American Football game in Florida. As they left the stadium Mary suffered an aneurysm and collapsed. Pat stated that the world may say as it wishes about the shortcomings of the Yanks and their Politics but as for him…..he’s impressed. He said that Mary’s heart had stopped but that people in the exiting crowd had immediately stopped to help, performing CPR and mouth to mouth until the Paramedics arrived. He further stated that within 20 minutes after she’d died she was alive again and in the ICU of a nearby hospital… 20 minutes! He said he’s grateful forever and that he’s never seen medicine performed with such efficiency.
We too find ourselves grateful for all as they are a truly loving couple and, frankly, not only would Pat have been lost without Mary but a world already in desperate need of cheer, manners and good will would have lost yet another ray of sunshine.
Onward!
The next morning, Sunday the 12th, we found time for breakfast, showers, a little relaxation and then back to Heathrow to catch a 1:20 p.m. flight to Amsterdam. Heathrow Airport is an amazingly busy place. One could ‘people-watch’ all day long. We cleared security, stopped in the bookstore and eventually made our way to our gate. As we waited for our flight to be called we watched the airport crowd going about their lives.
Here, a young couple sleeping on each other’s shoulders. They were obviously exhausted. We imagined that they must be close to the last leg of a long trip…..or maybe they just partied all night and were waiting for a 40 minute flight home….such possibilities. 
Over there were patrolling police officers… never alone, always in groups of two or three, dressed in armored vests over pressed uniforms and highly shined boots. They wore not helmets, but caps. Badges, nightsticks, handcuffs, ammo pouches, the ever present radios, curly cords reaching from their belts to the shoulder-mounted mic/speaker were also present as were what appeared to be H&K MP5 sub-machine guns. (9mm, 700 – 900 rounds per minute depending on the model, and a muzzle velocity of 400 meters per second…..if it was fired at me and miraculously missed I believe I’d expire anyway from fear!) That’s a lot of firepower….I feel either really safe, really worried, or really sorry that the world has come to this.
Our flight was called, we boarded and once again were on our way.
A mere 35 minutes later as we approached the coast of the Netherlands we beheld an amazing (to me) sight: scores, perhaps hundreds of windmills, (no not the picture-book kind),…..erected in a gigantic grid, ….offshore! All were functioning, their hundred-foot-long wings turning in the wind creating a miles-long kinetic sculpture in sea blue and bright white.
After doing a little research I see that I was looking at two wind-parks comprising a total of about 400MW of electricity….more than enough for 200,000 homes. Wow!
Landing at Schiphol Airport was interesting. Given that Schiphol is no Heathrow, the place is huge….mostly in terms of the acreage given to runways. It’s the 5th largest airport in the world but the 20th busiest. Of further note is that it’s 3 meters below sea level. Schiphol has 6 runways, (and plans for a 7th), the longest of which is a little over 12,400 ft….that’s nearly 2 ½ miles! No wonder our pilot never touched his brakes.
Because the wind here is unpredictable (direction-wise) and often quite strong, the runways are really spread out and are laid in different directions. The northern end of the last runway constructed is 7km from the control tower….taxi times can be as much as 20 minutes! (almost what it took to fly from London).
OK…..de-plane, collect bags, walk, walk, walk…..take a tram (where we saw a little girl who was tired of walking and decided to just sit down while waiting…traveling takes it out of kids even worse that is does their parents)…..
walk, walk….clear customs…walk, walk, walk….hire a taxi….become aware of the fact that driving through Amsterdam is not for the faint-hearted (more about that in a later post)….wow…..we’re here!
…and we opened the street door and were met with…..
….the stairs from Hell! (much more about them in later posts)!
Tune in tomorrow for our first week in Amsterdam!