We arrived at the airport in good time and sat watching the sun set drinking the last of our cheap Berlin beers and munching idly on crisps, generally reviewing the week. We had been extremely lucky with the weather and had discovered yet more hidden gems in the city.
Strange to say the traditional beggars had now been replaced by the more attractive but, pushy young charity sales people that tried desperately to charm and push you into subscribing to “save the whale” or “feed the starving blind lepers of Tipton”. You get the idea. Museums seem to be sprouting up all over the city and there is a trend to rebuild palaces that were long gone before the Lancasters flew over in the 1940’s, bit like us deciding to finish off Stonehenge when everyone knows all that is left is the scaffold.
There was a massive queue for the return flight and a pushy fat Russian bloke bardged his way to the front only to be sent back again by a determined German stewardess. Revenge for Stalingrad I should think. Me and Oliver waitied through the passport control and then played the priority boarding card and made our way onto the plane. Cannot say I have had any trouble with Ryanair, although I know stories of many who say they have. Overall I think they are excellent for the price and you just know they will not keep you waiting unless they have too, costs far too much money to have an aircraft parked up when it should be flying. Compared to flights I have experienced with the bigger companies like Thomas Cook and Thompson/First Choice, they are generally more comfortable as well.
So before we knew it we were landing safely at East Midlands. Only drawback here and I have to say it is as far as I know over all the airports outside the London Heathrow/Gatwick band, is that any flight that arrives after midnight is simply greeted with an utter lack of any transport away appart from the ever present taxis. No buses, trams, trains, or coaches. Note to self; on Planet Orton flights are only allowed to land at airports as long as there are conective public transport links opperating. In Berlin the transport continues all through the night in one form or another and not just from the obvious places like airports and major train stations.
Anyway, that was not a problem as I would be dossing at Anna’s with Oliver and we would catch the train back from derby in the morning. Oliver was just saying he thought Anna would have been waiting for us when he saw her standing holding a huge cardboard sign “Major Orton & Oliver”, actually she used a pet name for him like, “studmuffin” or something which for the life of me I cannot remember, perhaps one of them will read this and post a correction for me in the comments. Be that as it may, God bless her she had even put a couple of beers in the car for us to have a drink as she drove us to her home. What service!!! It is good to have friends like that.
Next day we had a pleasant train ride down to Wolverhampton and it was time to go our seperate ways. After travelling all that way and all around Berlin without any problems I was faced with the most irritaing 40 minutes delay in Wolverhampton where they were still messing about with rebuilding the bus station. A huge articulated lorry was struggling to get into the building site and it was jammed straight across the road from the 79 bus stop. WMPT crew were stood watching and they had very helpfully refused to let anyone on the empty bus that was in place before the truck got stuck and that disappeared to destinations unknown.
There was now quite a crew and my instinct was to walk home but, as we could see two more 79’s queued up behind the wagon I decided to wait. What a mistake that was. Eventually they manoeuvred the truck onto site and the buses rolled in. Of course the first one was sent out empty again and I do believe it was only the sight of a noose being formed from belts and people brandishing burning torches that persuaded the transport team to let us fianlly board the second bus. However, I was still in the mellow phase that remains for several days after a trip to Berlin and really did not care that much, but I certainly new I was back home.