Happy holidays?

This was not the way I planned it....After working hard the past months with 13 hours working days and only sporadic days off, I really looked forward to my well-deserved 2 months holiday in Europe - before heading off to the warm countries again.

It started sort of ok, with my bags being checked in all the way to London from Manila, thus saving me excess baggage fees of USD 330!!! Not only that: the friendly ground staff offered me seats in the emergency exit row on both flights....yippie....

The first flight Manila - Hong Kong was unspectacular, but immediately after landing I started feeling poorly. Very poorly. I was freezing and shaking like a mad person. Or a drug addict, hmmmm. Security staff paid a lot of attention to me half lying on a chair, wrapped in my jacket and shaking so hard my teeth were grinding. And I was tired, soooo tired. At this point in time I started thinking about signs and symptoms of decompression sickness. Oeps. But my last dive was two days before the flight, so even in my fever hallucinations my mind worked well enough to know it couldn't be DCS (probably ;) )

Never was a 12-hour flight longer! At least my condition made me sleep practically all the way, well helped by friendly cabin attendants with painkillers. Luckily, the lost baggage Gods were on my side and I managed to climb into a Cambridge-bound coach without any further problems. I was expecting custom's to stop me - never did i look more like a drug courier who's taken a bit too much herself - but I guess the you-don't-want-to=mess-with-me-look may have worked.

Back in the cottage now, I'm feeling almost ok again. After all, it was just a spell of the flu - however nasty it felt.

Now it's time to relax a little and then of course start planning the coming winter - I'll let you know where we are going.....Next week my sister, Marianne, and her family are coming to visit. I miss them a lot, so I can hardly wait to see them again.

Take care you all, I'll keep you posted.........

Lotsa xxx
Karin