We left Madeira shortly after noon on our first experience with a low-cost carrier. The check-in process was different but the fact that there are no assigned seets meant that we could opt for seats in the emergency exit rows, so there was plenty of legroom for me on the 3.5-hour flight to Stansted.
Our tour leader had sent us a biography of C.S. Lewis, A Shiver of Wonder, written by Derick Bingham, whom we will be meeting in a private gathering sometime during our tour of Ireland. Also included on the tour are visits to places identified with Lewis, including the inn where he spent his honeymoon. By the time we reached Stansted, I had read most of the book, enough that I could finish it on the 1-hour flight from Stansted to Belfast later that night.
Later? Almost 6 hours later, in fact. That was plenty of time for us to see all that Stansted airport had to offer, i.e., the same things you find in any modern airport: the same bookstores, souvenir shops (adjust the wording on the T-shirts), and food and beverage (a pizza by any other name is still a pizza).
But it was also enough time that we were among the very first to check in for the Easy Jet flight to Belfast, and we were therefore rewarded with the privilege of being in the first group to embark. Straight for the emergency exit row we went. Nice flight...finished the book.
But on our first sighting of Northern Island, the Emerald Isle was not green at all. At 11:00 p.m. it all looked very black (and yes, it was green the next morning in the sunlight). The sunlight? Another myth dispelled…we had been led to believe it rains all the time in Ulster, but the sun actually shone on Sunday.
Elizabeth was not only at the airport to greet us, she somehow got through security and met us at the baggage carousel! Must have plenty of good contacts after all these years of travelling in and out of Belfast International. I didn’t press her for details on how she got into the baggage claim area. I figured it was just as well I didn’t know.
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