We had done almost all the packing last night, so we got up early to finish the packing and tidy up the house. This time we remembered to take out the garbage. At about 10:30 am our friends Paula and Nick kindly picked us up and took us out to the airport.
Our Air Transat flight was scheduled to leave at 2 pm, so at 11 am the line-up was not very long. We asked for two aisle seats across from each other, and that wasn’t a problem.
By now it was only 11:30 am, so we went through security and into the terminal. Our flight’s gate was in the new part of YVR’s international terminal, which was still not quite complete. There was a sitting area with a little stream running through it, all surrounded by very realistic-looking artificial trees and shrubs. At the end of the sitting area was a huge aquarium containing schools of ocean fish. The little stream had fish, too, but they were glass ones representing the salmon that would otherwise be spawning there. In the background, instead of elevator music there was the sound of ocean waves and the cries of gulls and shore-birds.
We got sandwiches for lunch at Tim Hortons, and then went down to the gate to board our flight. Although it was supposed to leave at 2 pm, it didn’t actually leave until 2:15 pm. This was because the strong tail-winds would have made us arrive in London earlier than their air traffic control would have allowed.
The flight was the usual sort of cheap flight. The only problem was the two-year-old with Down’s syndrome in the row ahead of Paul. For the whole flight he yelled every 15 minutes. It was almost impossible to sleep because you no sooner fell asleep than he began yelling again. It was really annoying! His mother did her best to quieten him down but nothing seemed to work.
West Coast Hikers Around The World 