The Destination Beats The Journey

Well, according to my watch, it’s been 24 hours since we left Winnipeg airport. However, the days and nights are a little mixed up already! It really only took us 17 hours of traveling to arrive at our final destination, but we jumped ahead seven time zones. Three flights have brought us to Brussels, where we intend to take in as many sights as possible in the short time that we are here.

The first flight to Toronto was uneventful. It’s the overnight flight to Munich that did us in. A few people had suggested that we fly throughout the evening so that we could sleep the whole way and wake up on the plane the next morning in Europe. In theory, it’s a great idea... but in reality, we each had less than an hour’s sleep :-( Now it’s Sunday afternoon and we’ve been on the go since first thing Saturday morning. We’ll just try to fight sleep a few more hours until the sun starts to dip below the horizon here in Belgium.

The in-flight services were great. I liked Air Canada’s entertainment options. Listened to a few albums from start to finish on their XM Satellite sampler, and also saw two movies: “21” with Kevin Spacey and Guy Maddin’s “My Winnipeg”. My only real beef with the flights is the amount of legroom that they provide. Why is it that shorter people (sorry Debby) always feel they need to recline their seat all the way the second they climb into it? Not only that, but the flight personnel march us past all those luxurious seats in first class so that us taller folks know exactly what we’re missing out on in terms of the leg room!

Of course, there had to be some kind of hitch in the travel plans. Lufthansa ‘forgot’ our suitcases on the ground in Munich, so here we are in Brussels with nothing but the shirts on our backs. At least we have all of the electronics from my carry-on :-) If all goes well, our luggage should arrive on the doorstep before night falls on this side of the pond.

Anyway, thanks for reading the first ‘real’ blog post. Now that our trip is under way, I promise to add a new entry every day. And be sure to check out the pictures that follow this post. The first series of pictures will give you a bit of an idea as to the nature of our accommodations. I think they’ll work just fine :-)

BTW, Greg and Ross were hosting a Canada Day celebration for the staff at the house this afternoon, so we picked a great day to arrive :-)
Feel free to post your comments to this post...
Regards,
Andy

Day 1 pictures:

Preparing to pack in like sardines:

MJ, you would be proud of the Lufthansa meal choice - cheese sandwiches...

About to land in Brussels




The front of Greg and Ross' house where we're staying...




And the back of the house during the Canada Day staff BBQ




We get the third floor to ourselves :-)




The formal dining room can seat 50 comfortably when Greg & Ross are entertaining :-)