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Wednesday 15 June
The house was clean enough, pets were fed, and extras left out since Phoebe and Alex aren’t due to arrive until the next morning!. A fine winter’s day saw us off to the airport with taxi driver Gopher just after 3pm. Traffic was not too thick during the 40 minute, $75 trip, and we were able to check in, with bags headed all the way through to Barcelona quite promptly. Security and Immigration were mercifully uncrowded, and we were soon through to the airside.
The duty free hall smelt of fresh paint, and we paused for a while to use the free airport wi-fi, and whiled away an hour or so until it was time to make the stroll to Gate 18, where flight SQ208 to Singapore awaited. Boarding was smooth, and we were underway right on time, taking off to the northwest. The rather venerable Boeing 777-200 has fuzzy video screens, and muddy audio, so I chose to read rather than indulge in movie marathons. The flight continued, fighting strong headwinds over South Australia, passing close to Uluru before dodging between Bali and Java on the way to our destination. The crew were more shambolic than is usual for Singapore Airlines, but overall and OK flight, arriving into Singapore slightly late, just after midnight.
Thursday 16 June
This proved to be a very long day, for one reason or another. It began at midnight, with our arrival at Singapore. It is a very long stroll between gates in the newish Terminal 3 at Singapore’s Changi airport. It took all of 20 minutes between arrival gate B1, our departure gate for SQ68 to Barcelona, at gate A12.
The flightpath led first over Malaysia and Georgetown, and across the Bay of Bengal to India, followed by Pakistan and the borderlands of Afghanistan and Iran. Thence through Turkmenistan, where after a fine view of the capital Ashgabat, our path crossed the Caspian Sea, reaching the far shore near Baku. Our crossing of the Caucasus mountains would have provided a fine view of Mt Ararat but for the thick clouds encountered over Yerevan. The route the followed along the same line of latitude across the breadth of Europe to El prat airport at Barcelona.
The house was clean enough, pets were fed, and extras left out since Phoebe and Alex aren’t due to arrive until the next morning!. A fine winter’s day saw us off to the airport with taxi driver Gopher just after 3pm. Traffic was not too thick during the 40 minute, $75 trip, and we were able to check in, with bags headed all the way through to Barcelona quite promptly. Security and Immigration were mercifully uncrowded, and we were soon through to the airside.
The duty free hall smelt of fresh paint, and we paused for a while to use the free airport wi-fi, and whiled away an hour or so until it was time to make the stroll to Gate 18, where flight SQ208 to Singapore awaited. Boarding was smooth, and we were underway right on time, taking off to the northwest. The rather venerable Boeing 777-200 has fuzzy video screens, and muddy audio, so I chose to read rather than indulge in movie marathons. The flight continued, fighting strong headwinds over South Australia, passing close to Uluru before dodging between Bali and Java on the way to our destination. The crew were more shambolic than is usual for Singapore Airlines, but overall and OK flight, arriving into Singapore slightly late, just after midnight.
Thursday 16 June
This proved to be a very long day, for one reason or another. It began at midnight, with our arrival at Singapore. It is a very long stroll between gates in the newish Terminal 3 at Singapore’s Changi airport. It took all of 20 minutes between arrival gate B1, our departure gate for SQ68 to Barcelona, at gate A12.
The flightpath led first over Malaysia and Georgetown, and across the Bay of Bengal to India, followed by Pakistan and the borderlands of Afghanistan and Iran. Thence through Turkmenistan, where after a fine view of the capital Ashgabat, our path crossed the Caspian Sea, reaching the far shore near Baku. Our crossing of the Caucasus mountains would have provided a fine view of Mt Ararat but for the thick clouds encountered over Yerevan. The route the followed along the same line of latitude across the breadth of Europe to El prat airport at Barcelona.