Transatlantic

I think my day of traveling (all 36 hours) counts as the longest trip I've ever made by myself! Although the man at the airport saved my life with the extra weight fees of the bags, I found myself restoring balance to the universal yin and yang almost immediately. 41D was my seat on the plane. Usually I like to ask for a window seat, but because the man who checked me in was doing such a huge favor anyway, I decided I could live with D, which on most planes is an aisle seat - most international planes I've flown having 3 rows of 3. Not this plane. For 8 hours I sat uncomfortably sandwiched between two strangers in the middle seat of the middle row. I usually love flying - the longer the flight, the better! 12 hours China? Loved it! But 8 hours in seat 41D and my perspective has changed slightly.

We arrived at Gatwick 30 min early (6:30gmt/1:30est). In the airport I had to open and repack one of my bags to switch out my giant carry on for my horn. Yes, I checked my horn. And this is how:

1. place horn safely inside case
2. pad empty space in case with socks, underwear, etc.
3. place entire horn case inside large piece of luggage
4. place shoes in empty spaces of luggage to prevent sliding
5. pad empty space of luggage with large coats and t-shirts

I was glad to see that my horn made it safely through it's first sub-cabin adventure, although I never really want to have to do that again. So after trading my carryon luggage for my horn I was ready to head off into the city!

I had been debating for several days before the trip if I would try to navigate the Tube (£1.80) with my two bags weighing over 50lbs each or if I would just take a taxi (~£20). After struggling... no, not just struggling, straight up battling my bags just to get them on the Gatwick express I knew there was no way I was getting anywhere fast with them on the Tube, or period, really. Fortunately pretty much every bus in the city stops by London Victoria, so I found one that would go straight to King's Cross. And Although I was obviously out of place with my giant suitcases on the full bus, it only cost £2 and my luggage and I both made it safely across the city.

When I arrived at King's Cross, they were just announcing the platform for the train to Edinburgh. Unfortunately it was the 10am train and I was on the 1:30pm train. Yes. I was almost 4 hours early to the train station. So I got a luggage trolley, loaded up what was surely well over 120lbs of luggage and hung out. for 4 hours.

***side note to Harry Potter fans:

Of course my first instinct while at King's Cross Station was to visit platform 9 3/4, so

after about an hour in the station I did just that. Immediately I faced several problems with this endeavor. First, you can't even enter that section of the station without a ticket (I wonder if they accept letters from Hogwarts?). And from what I could tell, tracks 9 and 10 no longer share a platform. Forcing what is sure to be hundreds of young wizards running straight into the tracks to reach the Hogwarts Express. However, when in London in 2008, I made sure we sidetracked out to King's Cross to get some pictures at the infamous wizarding platform, but it appears that area is currently blocked off for construction. I hope they get it ready by september 1, for the first day of school! ;)

***

Four hours later, after sleeping, eating, reading, doing circles around the station, etc. I loaded everything on to the East Coast line to Edinburgh - a 4.5 hour journey. Despite the strain of now having been awake for 24 solid hours, I only managed to doze for about 1 hour on the train. for the other 3.5 hours I plugged in my iPod and watched the British country side fly by. It was gorgeous! I would recommend taking a train across the UK just to see it all! Shahida and her boyfriend, Simon (who I also knew from Zurich), met me at the station! Thank God Simon was there, because he carried one piece of luggage up the 4 flights to their apartment and came back to get the mine before I even reached the 2nd floor!

I think I managed quite well, not having slept for so long. I allowed myself to sleep till noon yesterday, thinking I deserved a solid 11 hours of sleep after my long journey. But I was up by 9 this morning, so I don't succumb to jetlag. I haven't really noticed it too much so far.

Yesterday I spend the day sleeping and reorganizing my suitcases so I could actually find things in them, then we went into the city to have fish and chips for dinner (which I actually liked!) then went to the movies (only £3 because it was student night) to see Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Today I'm meeting Shahida for lunch at work then wandering around the city before meeting up again for dinner and drinks!

There are a lot more plans in the works, but there'll be time for that later.