Our flight over the pond was blissfully uneventful.
Emerson fell asleep in my arms before we taxied out for the runway. After we reached cruising altitude, I put her to sleep in one of the flat bed seats. Libby also fell asleep after enjoying a sundae with all of the fixings. I stayed awake for the full meal, watched a movie, read a book, and then went to sleep for a couple of hours. After my morning coffee, I picked Emerson up (still peacefully sleeping) just before final approach. She woke up just as we pulled into the gate at Heathrow’s Terminal 4.
All of the BusinessElite passengers were given “Fast Track” passes for the much shorter line through immigration. Otherwise, I hate to think how long we might have been on line. After passing through immigration, we collected our luggage and proceeded to the Heathrow Express.
We’ve historically used the Gatwick Express to get into London. This was our first experience on the Heathrow Express, as we’d taken the Underground the handful of times we’d come into Heathrow previously. At 18 pounds per person (Emerson was free), the train wasn’t cheap. Worse, it wasn’t nearly as convenient (at least not from Terminal #4) as the Gatwick Express. While the trip into London is short (15 minutes), we wasted 10 minutes waiting for the train to leave Terminal 4, took that to a central Heathrow Terminal (maybe 2 minutes), exited that train (hassle), waited another 12 minutes for the actual Express train, and then had to quickly hustle onto the Heathrow Express train for the short ride into London Paddington (from which we had to take a taxi to the Allen House). The Underground would have been about as easy and cheaper: approx the same total time in travel, a single change of trains, but right to High Street Kensington.
Since our week started the day before, we checked into our timeshare right away.
It’s good to be home!
Despite moving our week to July this week, we were still given our flat (#26).
After relaxing a bit and having lunch, we took a nap in the afternoon. We then went shopping for some food and supplies at the local supermarket. We passed the evening in our flat and put Emerson to sleep around 10:30 local time after which she slept uneventfully through the night.
All things considered, the transatlantic flight and time change have gone well.