Home » Canada » Montréal, Columbus, July/August 1986 (part XI)

Part XI

Montréal, Columbus, July/August 1986 (part XI)

Peter Cameron
2006-03-07 22:18:28

Displayed times (last time: )

8/8/86, 0716 (BST)

And after a few hours' sleep and a drink of water, what more could I want?

Congratulations (almost) to BA for one of the best airline meals I've had, last night. After the sausge and cheese starter, there was a dish of chicken and cumquats on saffron rice, which was very tasty but spoilt by having been kept hot so long that it had dried out; then melon and strawberries, real fruit with real taste, served up on a real leaf of some sort. I was so tired I dozed off before it came and went very soundly asleep afterwards.

The film is exceptionally long, having been going since the end of dinner (which must be nearly three hours ago). I don't know what it is, though.

0744

A terrible thought just occurred to me. What if I didn't really wake up at 5 yesterday but just dreamed that I did? If so, and if I'm still dreaming, then either I've missed my flight, or I'll have to go through all this again!

0757

Full daylight, film over. Out of the window, blue sea with little pieces of cotton wool, pale horizon with grey band, and totally clear blue sky. Sunlight falling on the plane's wing, but I can't determine in which direction the shadow should lie.

For a moment I mis-cued and imagined us flying west. We must, in fact, be going some way south of the morning sun; the shadow is only some fifteen feet out on the wing. I guess the antisolar point is so far round behind us that it's impossible to see it from this window.

As I was dropping off to sleep, I was awakened several times by clamorous but unintelligible voices. This is what LaBerge calls the hypnagogic state.

0833

The land crept in unobtrusively -- a cape, a round bay, a river -- and took the place of the sea. On the other side of Ireland, we had sea again, but now we've just crossed the coast of Wales. Despite cloud cover, thick in places, there ahve been many windows. The only problem is that I have to crane my neck so to get any glimpse of the view. It's easier to stick with the interior landscape of my book.

Breakfast has come and gone too, and we should be down on the ground in half an hour.

0900

The approach to Heathrow is spectacular. It's clearer than I've ever seen it in England, with occasional little round clouds, and when the plane banks to turn (right, fortunately), the whole landscape of England looms over us. Following us on this merry-go-round is another plane: we are as if on the ends of an axis, though sometimes it seems less mechanical than that, a fish swimming through this aquatic world.

I suppose that this stacking will delay us. But I don't mind very much.

1100

There seems to be a need to close the account.

After landing we taxied for about ten minutes and still had a long bus ride to the terminal. The in-flight magazine raved about T4 which, it said, has dispensed with corridors -- but I'd much rather walk down a corridor than that!

At the bus stop, some hike from the terminal, were a couple from Vermont going to Oxford where their son is graduating.

We're passing High Wycombe; I've finished the dream book; and this bus is too bumpy to write more.

1116

One more thing, too good to omit. On a sign warning of roadworks: "Possible delays until December".