Thursday, May 28, 2009

 

Normality creeps back & Bangkok airport arrival.

Normality is beginning to creep up on us.
We both slept reasonably well last night. And today has been a day to pick up some of the normal things we do to keep busy.
It helps that the weather is better. Yesterday was horrid and others all felt sorry for us that it was so chilly and wet. We believe that the weekend will be quite warm - though we expect an easterly wind which will prevent some exciting heat.

There are a couple of loads of washing hanging out in the garden - soon the pile of ironing will be growing.
I actually cleaned the washing line before using it - a bit grimy and covered with cobwebs.

Later we went to Lidl for a bit more shopping. We have been drinking iced lemon tea a lot in Thailand and I bought 2 litres in Lidl for 99p (about 50 Baht). Now we need the sunshine to make it the drink of choice.

This afternoon we began the long task of sorting photos - ours and also Jamie and Mam's. I shall add Thailand photos each day to this blog and recall our time there. I guess I will be doing that for weeks!
At some point, Bill will begin sorting and arranging pictures for our album.

I have also spent a little time on EBay. I had hoped to have things ready to list when we got back, but I didn't get around to more describing. But there are things which can be listed for the second time and this afternoon I put 14 items on for the bidders to find.

We have seen Frieda and Rose today. Frieda so enjoys have the important job of feeding the cats and refuses help from Rose. The cats have survived well so we should be glad. We just wish that the back door had been locked when we returned!
George cat has been a pest - having caught 2 birds since our return. Perhaps he thinks he is doing something special for us! He hasn't been bird hunting for a long time until now. Yesterday afternoon there were feathers all over the kitchen floor!

Bill is now out in the garden. There has been a lot of rain and plants have gone wild. The garden is like a jungle. The lawns (such as they are) have grown long and all the bits that are not grass (most of it) have sprung tall and flowered. Tomorrow will be grass cutting day.


I must get on soon and prepare dinner. The plans for yesterday were abandoned - we were just too tired. So tonight we will have gammon steaks in a honey sauce with Jersey Royal potatoes and some other vegetables too.

And now back to the beginning of our holiday.
We flew into the impressive new airport at Bangkok. It is about 2 and a half years old. I saw it on my last trip but Bill had not seen it. We had a just a short while to look round before flying to Phuket.
The ground covered by this 4 storey terminus is immense and quite a lot of walking is involved to get from one place to another - or running, as we had to on Tuesday!

Here are a few facts from the airport website........

Facilities
130 passport control checkpoints for arrivals, 72 for departures.
26 customs control checkpoints for arrivals, 8 for departures.
22 baggage conveyor belts.
360 check-in counters. There are 100 additional counters for passengers without luggage.
107 moving walkways.
102 elevators.
83 escalators.

Some 50 dining venues dot the 25,000-square-metre airport terminal.








The airport seemed very quiet, despite the fact that Bangkok is the crossroads of the far east; planes from all over arrive and leave from Bangkok.



We were happy to arrive at the airport on Phuket to greet our family. Jessica and John didn't know it was us they were there to meet. Suddenly they turned and shouted "Nanny!" and ran to us.
But before long it was our bags on wheels that were more interesting!