Sat in the window of our room at Dukes Hotel in St James. Not a particularly good view and having opened the window there is a lot of noise from a cluster of aircon fans a couple of floors down. The service levels are quite high here but not sure I’d be particularly happy to have paid six hundred and fifty quid which would have been the alternative to points. Having paid nothing I guess we got what we got.
The room itself was good. Everything worked. Even had lights in the ceiling. One of the worst sides of hotel rooms is that for some reason they choose not to have enough lights. The breakfast was top notch as were the martinis last night. The bar was rammed all night. Amazing how many people were keen to part with twenty five quid for a drink.
In half an hour or so we are off on the next bit of our journey – LCY to BER. Our John, being a musician and creative is moving there. Berlin, apaz, is the centre of the house and techno scene. Stuff like that. If yer going to do these things do them while you are young. John is twenty four years old and has the world at his feet. Good luck to the lad.
Nice meal at Dishoom Carnaby last night. THG and I shared a starter and a main. Otherwise would have been too much. An age thing probs 🙂 I had the foresight to book a table. When we arrived there was a huge queue outside and the wait even once you made it inside the building was quite long. Like thirty mins to an hour. I overheard one queuer asking a member of staff how much time she had left to queue and got the answer “thirty five minutes or so”.
After we finished and left the restaurant the queue outside was even longer. We had a nice time but the food wasn’t that amazing that I’d queue a long time for it.
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Sat in seat 10C on the 13.25 from LCY to Berlin. I’d forgotten how stressful I find airline travel considering how much I’ve flown. There are two ways of doing it.
First class, or business as a minimum, comfortable lounge with a stiffish gin and tonic or a cocktail or two and some light nibbles. Large plane with comfortable accommodation and plenty of overhead locker space. Champagne when you get on then ease into the afternoon ahead.
The other way is a full short haul flight to Berlin where they are constantly looking for cabin bags to put in the hold. I’m only in Group 3 for boarding having recently been dropped to Bronze status with the BA Exec Club so overhead locker space certainty ain’t a certainty. I’ve never been really comfortable flying until settled in my seat.
Anyway I’m ere now and working on the trefbash playlist. I can afford to be brutal. Got far too much run time. Will also have a secondary playlist to run from around twelve thirty. Bit of Frank, Sade, stuff like that.
Occurs to me this is only my second trip this year that involves getting on a plane, the last being South Africa in February. I’m seeing planes fade out of the Davies canon. Nowt planned as yet for next year other than the notion of going interrailing in September. Mind you with our John living in Berlin I daresay there could be a few hops over to see him.
With forty five minutes to go I sense the skipper has nudged the joystick ever so slightly to bring us into a very gentle slide down to Berlin Brandenburg Airport. Sbeen a while since we’ve been to the city. Would have been a Euro-IX conference. A world that casually slid into my past, masked by covid lockdown induced inactivity on the conference front.
On reflection I don’t mind not going to conferences. At least the conferency bit. I’m ok with going to the socials.
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STOP PRESS First release of tropical trefbash tix sold out sometime this afternoon. We were in the air. The last of the “I Like Pina Coladas” tickets went at the same time and there will be no more of those. I am able to release a second batch of tickets thanks to the huge generosity of the sponsors and because eleven people have donated hard cash for their tickets and the cause. Thanks guys and gals.
I do like a pina colada.