Greece 2014 Adventure!! Day 1

28 years ago hubby and I wanted to go to Greece for our honeymoon, this never happened. Now 28 years later we are on our way to a Greek Islands for adventure and our second honeymoon!!! So out came all the DVD's: Shirley Valentine; My Big Fat Greek Wedding; My Life in Ruins and Mama Mia (the musical with Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosman who proved he could not sing!) and a marathon of Greek culture ensured. Our daughter is a high school History and Art Teacher and lectured at University; so many nights a few lessons on Greek culture and history ensued. Then it was off to the bookstore to get books and information on the places we planned to visit and I even downloaded a Greek Speaking Parrot onto my cellphone to help me brush up on my Greek. Except the parrot sounded as though he had had one to many bottles of Uzo!!.

This was also to be our first over seas holiday together ever! We were going over to celebrate my "little Greek brother" George's (joujou) wedding so we were getting to experience our very own "my big fat greek wedding" and I was also going to climb Mt Ainos the highest mountain on Kefalonia. Which turns out to be the highest mountain of all the Ionic Islands as well as a European Ultra! I planned to put the South African, Team Zodwa and the Meals on Wheels flag high on the summit.

The last 2 days were somewhat hectic and we opted to take the Gautrain to OR Tambo Airport. What a blessing that turned out to be in 12 minutes we were at the airport, I will never ever drive to the airport again!. We awoke at 4h00 and somewhat got a little delayed and ended up with only 15 minutes to get to the station, so I drove hubby's car there, remembering I drive a response car every day LOL, let's just say we got there with 5 minutes to spare!. Our eldest son then took the car back home and would fetch us on our return. I was most impressed with the Rosebank Station, the layout and the cleanliness. Just the staff were somewhat dense and where not very helpful at 5h30 in the morning which meant we had to run around checking out the boards and we just had to run to catch the train. Luckily Gautrain management must of thought about this as their signage and constant announcements allow for clarification. We must of looked a real sight trying to get our ticket cards to work (we were scanning in the wrong place in our panic) and trying to race with our suitcases on wheels. The pulley handle on the heaviest bag did not pull out for what ever reason, my hubby (he is a short Welshman/Irishman) was dragging the bobbing suitcase by a small strap as it was twisting and turning. Such tourists!! Nothing like an early morning panic and adrenaline rush to get the old bones going!We had to alight at the Rosebank Train at the Sandton Station and then hop onto the Sandton train to the airport.

We were lucky enough to see a spectacular African sunset over Jozi just before our arrival at the airport. The train was really fast and did wobble somewhat similar to been in a plane with turbulence, except the fall was not has fast and high.

Once at the airport we got our tickets and waited in surprisingly long queues to get out tickets and then waited for our flight to Abu Dhabi. Our own OR Tambo airport looks just as promising and as good as other international airports, what makes us different is the lack of service and apathy we offer. We really need to get this right, the guys at other airports are far more energetic and on the ball in comparison. I am tired of saying "well this is Africa what do you expect" we need to start aligning ourselves with the service on offer at other international airports, whats the point of having this beautiful and amazing airport in which to showcase our offerings to potential international investment! This is our corridor people lets get it right!

After a good old South African breakfast and coffee we went to check in to board, only to face another very long queue which made everyone late. We had to make a mad dash (Hubby had fixed the large suitcase's extended pulley handle by now thank goodness, my hero!) and we together with several others raced to board our plane in time just making our 09h25 cut off!. By now we were somewhat flustered boarded the bus to take us across the tarmac, hanging onto straps from the ceiling for dear life as we made our very excited way to board our waiting plane and continue our adventure.

So as I have already said many many times I hate flying. I did my nails into hubby's hand on take off and on landing and should we experience any turbulence I am sure we are going to just die!!
I was really impressed with the Etihad airways. the inside of the plane was very comfortable and I always got a window seat (which is probably not a good idea as I don't want to watch the plane falling to my death or watch black smoke spewing from an engine).

our youngest son Jordan would have been in his element - ports for you cellphone and laptops and Wi Fi on the plane who would have thought it possible 20 years ago! how times change and how technology has advanced!

I was disappointed though I was looking forward to the usual safety talk with the usual hand signals from the pokerfaced airhostess. (do you think they practice in front of a mirror) it was this time that i thought of my fellow adventure Pamela Buckle (SA's Adventure girl). I am sure the two of us would have been in fits of giggles. Yes we did have the two air hostess for a few minutes, but now we had to look to our personal TV screens attached to the back of the seat in front of us to watch a video type game version of the instructions. the animated cham had the biggest eyes ever as he explained to us together with an animated little boy with equally big eyes, what we should do in the event of an "unlikely emergency". Well if you just looked and their animated panic stricken faces it was enough for me to run for the hills not looking back. Cheeeeez people this was scarey!

What was really awesome was that we each had our own television so we could watch the flight path (not a good idea as when we hit turbulence and we started to fly off course my imagination went wild and panic set in) or watch TV series and movies. I was too afraid to sleep for many reasons that I just can't explain and it did not help that my eldest son told my hubby and I that we must not talk to or trust anyone (think he is watching far to many military action movies and is studying Criminology to become a Profiler and I think he had visions of us been kidnapped and held ransom!!) and we had also just had several commercial planes crashing or shot down in recent months and weeks and days eeeeeou!I must tell you that we are a very close family and share a very strong bond with our kids and this was the first time that both parents were going away for so long (hubby and I have gone away on the odd weekend) and flying in a plane together, this was creating anxiety from both sides LOL.

we were soon on our way leaving Jozi behind us and we felt like a king and queen. Out came the menus and lunch arrived. The food was great except for one or two dishes (was not sure what it was ....did not want to ask in case!)

the Airhostesses all look like dolls and very elegant and professional. They made all of us feel special.

after a long a tiring flight we landed in Abu Dhabi - here is proof we survived!!

this was a very colourful airport and we were meet with very helpful and efficient airport staff. We did not know about the airport lounge until later and decided that we would make use of this on our way back. We slept and manipulated our bodies onto the very uncomfortable plastic chairs the recliners where all taken.