Today I fly to Florence via Paris so up at 6am having showered last night. Ian had prepared a light breakfast for us and the we were off to Heathrow by 7-ish.
The trip to Heathrow Terminal 4 was easy enough - just a run along the M3 and then onto the M25 which we then branched off onto the Southern Perimeter road. Probably about 30 or 40 minutes all up.
Checking in was easy self checkin and then hand my suitcase over but the gate was not known so after security had to hang around in the terminal for a while. The flight was 15 minutes late asking off and we landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport just on midday but a long run up to the gate took another 15 minutes.
Having arrived at terminal 2E I was due to depart from terminal 2F at 13:20 - ha!
The embarkation was delayed for 20 minutes and then they loaded us all onto busses while they went around the airport looking for a likely plane. Thank goodness they bypassed the Air Ukraine one. Having got onto the plane in good order we have had to sit here for over an hour - making us even later while the pilot locates some information - perhaps where the takeoff runway is.
Just to go back a little, getting from terminal 2E to 2F was pretty straightforward apart from going through security and border police where I was the only one going through and there were no directions in any language as to which we to go. The border cop was too busy gazing at his phone to pay much attention and when I asked him he gave me a casual flick of the finger which only gave a general direction and no indication that I needed to go through a lateral door. Eventually I asked some sort of hostess and she put me straight at last.
Eventually we have take off - well over an hour late. I thought African time was bad enough. Hopefully the return flight via KLM/Amsterdam will be better organised.
Well, the drama continued. On approaching Florence we were diverted to Bologna instead due to high winds. Arriving at Bologna we were told that the ground staff would ensure that we got to Florence either by bus or by train - Ha! There were no Air France ground staff and the people at the info desk, nice as they were, only wanted to get rid of us quickly. A flight from Munich to Florence had been given the same treatment. The choices were a bus which would take about 95 minutes, or a train which would take about 1 hour. Like many others I chose the train but it was a 20 minute bus ride to the station and then a 20 minute wait for the train. I could only get a 1st class ticket but at least it got me to Florence at around 6:30pm, then a taxi to my accommodation. Having given the taxi driver the address in my best Italian it did not take long to get there. On arrival I was greeted at the door by Roberto, a 60ish man, and shown my room and the rest of the facilities.
The flat is old, spartan, but has the necessary facilities except for wifi. The worst thing is that Roberto smokes so the place reeks of his tobacco.
Since I wanted to get some food stuffs for breakfast Roberto took me on an exciting car ride to a supermarket where I found what I needed.
Later, watched some Italian TV with Roberto but did not understand much of what was going on, and then to bed.
