Wednesday 24th June 2015

Monday

I wake up at four in the morning, with a glorious pre-dawn light creeping round the curtains. Despite being a part of Copenhagen, there is no sounds of the city, just nature waking up and feeling pleased with itself. I drift back off, and stir again at quarter to six, I think about things and realise that I had once again failed to change the time on my phone, so it was an hour later, and so I was running late. As if the underline that, I get a text from my colleague asking if I had been down to breakfast yet.

I leap up and get dressed, Frank is waiting downstairs, so I join him for coffee. We talk about the upcoming meeting, and how it might go.

The ten minute drive to the venue for the meeting can either be done via the busy motorways, or through housing estates. It all depended how the sat nave felt. As it turned out, it took me the easy way through the houses, bringing me to the offices in very quick time, allowing me time to review mails and documents. Frank arrives, so we go in, ready for the day ahead.

We finish at half three, and one of our colleagues needed a lift to the airport, a taxi had been mentioned, but I had little else to do for the day, so I offered. When I tell people back home that there are traffic jams in Denmark, the attitude seems to be where are they going, then? As if people in other countries don't have jobs, cars. It was a 35 km drive to the airport through endless intersections and junctions, with lots of jams, slow traffic, and all done in glorious warm sunshine.



I get him there 45 minutes before his flight, but then have to drive back of course, through yet more jams and slow moving traffic. And to make matters worse I had selected the address of the office, rather than the hotel as my destination, so it was with a long, deep groan when I saw their offices on my left hand side. I pull over, reprogram the sat nav, and drive back through the houses to the hotel, taking just ten minutes of course.

I dump my bag in my room, change out of my short and tie, put on an old t shirt and grab a camera and go back outside for a walk around the area surrounding the hotel. I had decided against going to the city centre as there looked like massive storm clouds surrounding us as I drove to the airport, and wandering around in the thunderstom did not appeal. Of course, as it turned out, there was no thunder, no rain, just more warm sunshine.



Gentofte is quiet and leafy, but it has a commercial centre with convenience stores, cafes and a nice church. But nothing more than to take any more than 15 minutes of my time. I photograph it all, then walk back to the hotel for dinner and a beer or two.



Because of the silly time of my flight the next morning, I went to bed at nine, in the hope I would be able to sleep through what was the longest evening of the year. Not entirely successful.

Wednesday

Because my flight was at 07:20, I had to be on the road some two hours or so before that, and therefore up half an hour prior to that. I set the alarm for half four. I was awake at four, which thanks to the time difference was 03:00 back home in Blighty. Outside a milky light was abroard, even the birds were not singing yet. I pack, was and go downstairs to check out.

Once on the road, it is gloriously quiet. The sat nav takes me back to the airport, passing where I had been held up the previous evening. I zoom through at 110 kmh. The sun is showing over the horizon, it feels great to be going home, even if I am so tired my eyes are itching.

At the airport there are no care hire staff about. So I park the car up, walk to the terminal to drop the keys off. I quick walk to the other terminal to check in and drop my bag off: all painless. Even though there is a massive queue for security, and the four minute wait from this point sign seemed very optimistic, it was right, and once scanned and I had all my stuff and put my belt back in so my jeans would not fall down, I set off looking for breakfast.

I am still trying to work out why shopping is such a big thing at airports. I like a bottle of aftershave or a nice bottle of whisky as the next guy, but there are hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of square metres of retail space, all just opening up at six. All I want is a coffee and a bite to eat. I find a cheap place, get a cheese roll and a large coffee, then comes the harder task of finding a place to sit. Mustn't let people have more space than shops, must we? All we want is a place to sit, not much to ask, is it?

I walk to the gate to find it already very busy, I find a seat and check my mails as more and more people arrive. We wait and wait, and eventually the doors are opened and we can pile on board, there is the usual scramble for luggage space above the seats, and I look at some of the large cases which some are pulling and wonder how those can be allowed as carry on? But, once inside the plane, there is just about enough space for everyone, without the need for the usual appeal from the crew for people to take smaller bags out to make room, as the flight is being delayed. I feel the plane taxi, the engines rev and the thunder off down the runway. As we lift off, I close my eyes and drift off to sleep for an hour, only waking up when the little girl in the seat behind thoughtfully kicks the back of my seat, which she does every few minutes.

Blighty hoves into view below. We circle a lot, getting lower before we go on final approach, dropping below the level of the clouds, over the M23 and down onto the runway. It is ten past eight.



I let the rush die down after we arrive at the gate, I mean this gives our bags time to make their way to the reclaim area. No point waiting there. The long walk to immigration, then downstairs to the reclaim, where after a minute or so, my bag appears. I just have to get to the station now. My plan had been to upgrade my ticket so I could go to St Pancras and then catch the high speed line back home, but half of Europe was queuing up, trying to make sense of our over-complicated ticketing system. I decided that i would rather use the quiet, lesser-used lines via Redhill and Tonbridge, on a bright day it would even be a pleasure.



And for the most part it was: the train from the airport to Redhill was busy, but from there to Tonbridge there were plenty of seats, and the views out of the window were glorious. I just watched the greenery pass by, go through quiet stations and leafy villages.

I had a short wait at Tonbridge before a direct train to Dover pulled in; and once again I get a set with fine views over the Kent landscape, passing by Marden where I see half a dozen photographers looking round the orchid meadow. We trundle on.

There were strikes and blockades in Calais: I mention this as when this happens, roads in Dover quickly get jammed, and my fear is that I would not be able to get a taxi home. As usual, my fears were unfounded, and outside the station, there were 5 taxis, and the driver said there were no jams. Yet.

When I get home, I look at the traffic cameras, and see that between Ashford and Folkestone, the motorway was closed, and there were two lines of parked trucks waiting to get to the port.

It was wonderful to be home, even better that there would be no airports or passport control until the 21st July at the earliest. I am home at midday, but already I have been up 9 hours, and am shattered. I check my mails, write a couple more, but soon I am snoozy so sleep on the sofa, whilst birds chirp away outside.

Jools picks up fish and chips on the way home from work, and she did not encounter many jams either, so was home at half six.

After catching up, we watch a recording of the penultimate episode of Jonathon Strange., which just gets better and better. Sad that Sunday will see the final one. Just ten days wait now until the holibobs.