Europe Honeymoon (1) - Airflight
We booked our trip through CTC at the Suntec City promotion fair. The package is $1998 + $369 (taxes) for 10 days. We extend our tour at Paris (last stop) to 14 days (in total). We paid an additional $100 to tour agency for the extension and around $300 Euro for our Paris hotel stay. We booked the extension hotel (Hotel Taylor) through the internet by our own guts feel and surfing the net information. In total, we paid around $6000 for 2 persons, and spent an additional S$4000 (cash) and S$1000 (credit) on shopping and food etc.
This is the first time i took an airflight. NO JOKING! Really, so old and its my first time taking plane.
We depart on 18 October 2006 from Singapore to Helsinki with a 1 hour stop at Thailand on Finair airlines.
18/10 8pm - Singapore to Thailand (stopover)
We meet our assistant tour guide, Seto (from ctc) at Changi air-port at 6.45pm to collect our flight tickets. Our official tour guide, Dennis is already at Switzerland so he will meet us directly there.
The air-plane meal is Singaporean food, simple. They serve with plastic utensils. This short 2 hour flight has more Thais.
18/10 Thailand to Helsinki (Finland) - Transit
This is a 14 hour flight. We are tired and slept on the plane. Occasionally I woke up to walk to the toilet (and to exercise the numb limbs and legs). The seats are quite cramp and uncomfortable that I had a backache and can't sleep well.
The airflight serve meals with metal utensils and Thai food. Their bread roll is cold (not nice). Tea is bland as they only give 1 small sugar which is not enough. Meals servings are small but they serve about 2-3 meals on the long flight so its still okie.
When we are about to land at Helsinki for transit to Switzerland (Zurich), there is an announcement that there is a strike at Finland Finair at 5am. We didn't notice the announcement initially until it repeat in Chinese. When we land at Helsinki, we went to check the flights chart and all flights are cancelled! We panicked but our assistant tour guide ask us to calm down and he will try to find a solution with the airline. We noticed that there is only 1 lady working at the airline desk and she is frustrated with a lot of customers. We try to approach her but she brush us away. In the end our asst tour guide help to negotiate with the lady for other connecting flights.
After waiting for about 40minutes, our asst tour guide inform us that he has arranged with the airline for connecting flights to other countries to transit to Switzerland (our first stop). However, some people will be separated in different flights and may be to different countries for transit. Me and M panicked as I am first time taking flight and if separated, it may be terrible.
Luckily, our asst tour guide told us that M and me are on the same flight to Stockholm, together with another couple as we are taking extension and thus priority to fly off first. The rest of the tour group will fly off later and meet together at Zurich (Switzerland). We checked the time and realise that the Stockholm flight is soon and we rush off to the air-port checkpoint. There is only 2 counter staff working. The man whom we approach at the counter was trying to be difficult with us. He asked a lot of questions on our purpose of visit and duration and even ask to see our return ticket. He wasn't willing to let us go even though we explained nicely to him. Only until his colleague told him that our air flight is immediate and we have no time to loose, then he let us off unwillingly. This is a terrible counter staff and we realise that our other tour members also encounter the same problem with this guy (later on).
When we past the checkpoint, we have only few minutes and the aeroplane checkin is very far. We ran across the terminal and it makes me feel sick when i suck in the cold air in my lungs (the temperature is very cold and we have to drag our hand lugagge too). This is all because of that irritating counter staff. We managed to catch the flight bus and it took us to a small plane (together with the other couple G and J). When we alight from the flight bus and go up the small plane, the air is so cold and wind is blowing. When we talk, warm air can be seen to vaporise. Luckily, both M and me have a light windbreaker with us. But the other couple G and J does not have any windbreaker with them and they are freezing.
The small airplane is interesting and i got a window seat. The clouds are so beautiful!
We reach Stockholm 2.30 hours later, around 10am.
Stayed tune to the next posting on our day at Stockholm :)
This is the first time i took an airflight. NO JOKING! Really, so old and its my first time taking plane.
We depart on 18 October 2006 from Singapore to Helsinki with a 1 hour stop at Thailand on Finair airlines.
18/10 8pm - Singapore to Thailand (stopover)
We meet our assistant tour guide, Seto (from ctc) at Changi air-port at 6.45pm to collect our flight tickets. Our official tour guide, Dennis is already at Switzerland so he will meet us directly there.
The air-plane meal is Singaporean food, simple. They serve with plastic utensils. This short 2 hour flight has more Thais.
18/10 Thailand to Helsinki (Finland) - Transit
This is a 14 hour flight. We are tired and slept on the plane. Occasionally I woke up to walk to the toilet (and to exercise the numb limbs and legs). The seats are quite cramp and uncomfortable that I had a backache and can't sleep well.
The airflight serve meals with metal utensils and Thai food. Their bread roll is cold (not nice). Tea is bland as they only give 1 small sugar which is not enough. Meals servings are small but they serve about 2-3 meals on the long flight so its still okie.
When we are about to land at Helsinki for transit to Switzerland (Zurich), there is an announcement that there is a strike at Finland Finair at 5am. We didn't notice the announcement initially until it repeat in Chinese. When we land at Helsinki, we went to check the flights chart and all flights are cancelled! We panicked but our assistant tour guide ask us to calm down and he will try to find a solution with the airline. We noticed that there is only 1 lady working at the airline desk and she is frustrated with a lot of customers. We try to approach her but she brush us away. In the end our asst tour guide help to negotiate with the lady for other connecting flights.
After waiting for about 40minutes, our asst tour guide inform us that he has arranged with the airline for connecting flights to other countries to transit to Switzerland (our first stop). However, some people will be separated in different flights and may be to different countries for transit. Me and M panicked as I am first time taking flight and if separated, it may be terrible.
Luckily, our asst tour guide told us that M and me are on the same flight to Stockholm, together with another couple as we are taking extension and thus priority to fly off first. The rest of the tour group will fly off later and meet together at Zurich (Switzerland). We checked the time and realise that the Stockholm flight is soon and we rush off to the air-port checkpoint. There is only 2 counter staff working. The man whom we approach at the counter was trying to be difficult with us. He asked a lot of questions on our purpose of visit and duration and even ask to see our return ticket. He wasn't willing to let us go even though we explained nicely to him. Only until his colleague told him that our air flight is immediate and we have no time to loose, then he let us off unwillingly. This is a terrible counter staff and we realise that our other tour members also encounter the same problem with this guy (later on).
When we past the checkpoint, we have only few minutes and the aeroplane checkin is very far. We ran across the terminal and it makes me feel sick when i suck in the cold air in my lungs (the temperature is very cold and we have to drag our hand lugagge too). This is all because of that irritating counter staff. We managed to catch the flight bus and it took us to a small plane (together with the other couple G and J). When we alight from the flight bus and go up the small plane, the air is so cold and wind is blowing. When we talk, warm air can be seen to vaporise. Luckily, both M and me have a light windbreaker with us. But the other couple G and J does not have any windbreaker with them and they are freezing.
The small airplane is interesting and i got a window seat. The clouds are so beautiful!
We reach Stockholm 2.30 hours later, around 10am.
Stayed tune to the next posting on our day at Stockholm :)
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