Round The World and other travels

As usual, I managed to be one of the very first to board the aircraft, having moved out of the lounge as soon as the boarding announcement was made. I settled into 1A and looked through both the High Life and Business Life magazines while the plane filled up. The process didn't take too long and we were just about ready to go on schedule. Unfortunately a number of aircraft were due to push back at the same time and we had to wait for our turn, which came just 7 minutes down at 0912. It was a short taxi out to the westerly runway and we were airborne by 0923. As we climbed out of EDI, I noted that there was just a hint of mistiness, which gave the morning a distinctly autumnal feel.

We had a longer than usual run westwards before the big left turn, taking us west of Glasgow. In fact when we eventually approached Carlisle, it was in a south-easterly direction, which is most unusual ex-EDI - at least in my experience. By that time, a cooked breakfast had been served and I was tucking into the usual - but still very welcome - helping of bacon, sausage, scrambled egg, mushrooms and tomato, served with a small roll, some butter and strawberry jam, a small carton of orange juice and a cup of coffee. We were almost overhead Manchester as I finished eating. I noticed that we were flying at only 31,000 ft, which was a bit lower than usual.

As we approached the north of London, the Captain announced a short hold of just five minutes, which we executed at 9,000 ft. We were soon passing over Central London, just west of St Paul's Cathedral, but in the very cloudy conditions I couldn't see much apart from City office blocks and Tower Bridge.

We touched down smoothly on 27R at 1025 and braked hard, giving a nice, short taxi to our gate, where we arrived slightly ahead of schedule at 1028.