April 29, 2011
After arriving a bit later than scheduled to YEG, I was able to obtain my boarding pass and clear security in mere minutes. Curiously, only the boarding pass for my first flight segment was printed.
After clearing security I soon ran into my friends Matty and Kenton, who were off to Vegas for a houseboating trip. Kenton mentioned that a person he knew from one of his classes was on my flight to London, who turned out to be seated next to me on the flight to London.
The flight arrived at the gate in London a little bit tardy – we had to circle for a while for clearance to land, wait on a taxiway for another plane to get out of the way, and even wait to be pushed back as the plane was initially parked too close to the terminal. As a result, my connection became fairly tight. Tighter yet when I found out how fast security and check-in lines at Heathrow go (read: SLOW, even though both lines were quite short). After running through many hallways and watching our bus driver struggle with door related technical difficulties I arrived at the Lufthansa check-in desk about 50 minutes before my flight to Munich. Getting to the counter about 35 minutes prior to the flight, I was told it was overbooked and I could wait a few minutes to find out what would happen. Ultimately, I was upgraded to business class and told to head quickly to the gate – which must have been about 3 Edmonton airports away by foot.
Business class is nice (who would complain about extra seat space, better food, metal cutlery, and free beer?) but probably not worth the cost. I would have been quite happy to have been kicked to the next flight to Munich – which should still have arrived in time for my flight to Leipzig – if that meant receiving denied boarding compensation. While in flight just above the clouds, I saw another plane flying in the opposite of our direction just skimming the top of the clouds – which looked pretty cool!
I have attached two pictures – one from Edmonton to London and one from London to Munich – you can probably figure out which one is which.
I meant to make a few comments about my luggage and take a few pictures before leaving. Unfortunately, I ran into a time crunch, but I did take a picture of the majority of what I have brought. Despite bringing a sweater, pair of pants, pair of shoes, and a roll of duct tape (yes, regular old duct tape) for Serge – totalling 2262g (or 5 lbs), I have remained within carryon limits. The majority of my items are packed in my MEC internal frame backpack (I have omitted its “hood” to save weight and space), but I also have a small reusable Cactus Creek shopping bag for a “second carryon”. On my Ryanair flights I will be without Sergej’s items freeing valuable weight and space.
Packing for this trip has posed somewhat more of a challenge than my trip last summer. Sergej’s items aren’t a big deal because the star alliance airlines will be more flexible in their allowances than Ryanair. The kicker is that taking a course in Spain means I am bringing about 3 kg (6.6 lbs) of material just for school: notably, a netbook, netbook charger, netbook neoprene sleeve, and course materials. Fortunately, I was able to save money ($11) and weight/space on my flight to Europe by having the required book shipped to Sergej’s apartment in Leipzig. Of course, some trade-offs must be made: I have about 5 days worth of clothing, so I will be doing laundry more often than my peers. In part to compensate for this, I packed some powdered laundry detergent (60 mL Nalgene bottles rock) so I can do small loads of just a few items in a sink and let them air dry. I have packed a full set of running clothes for exercising and have all the essentials. Of course, for five weeks I will have to buy some toiletries as I go, soap and shampoo for example, but I would have to purchase those in Edmonton anyway so the impact is negligible.
Despite the need to pack more in the same weight/space this time, I remain adamant that avoiding the need to check baggage is great. Because of the airline imposed limit my bag is light and easy to carry. After each flight I do not need to collect anything from the baggage claim. I am saving the 60 Eur Ryanair would charge to check my bag on the four flights I am taking with Ryanair. When running into flight connection or delay problems, it is much easier to be flexible when all your baggage is with you. It was easy to duck through Heathrow this morning, and the airline agent did not need to be concerned about whether my luggage could make it to the plane on time – only whether I could.
I close this entry in the Munich airport, which is quite nice and overrunning with Lufthansa planes. It won’t be posted until later because the wireless internet access here is, unfortunately, not free.
Adios!