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Thursday 06 October / Overcast.
My Favorite Photo of the Day

Ok, last day, and I am typing this from memory.  Great night's sleep, great breakfast, easy checkout, a short walk to the train station, and off to Heathrow.  We checked our luggage, Lisa had her last smoke on the continent, we boarded the plane, took off our shoes, and indulged one last time on our way home to Halifax via St. John's NF.

In St. John's we were told to get off the plane to clear customs and that our luggage would come off as well.  We went through customs.  Impressive at first, 5 booths, 5 people in the booths, now this is unusual.  Except, 3 of them could not get their PCs to boot.  Why they were not booted and ready to go minutes if not hours ago I do not know.  We then waited for our luggage.  It come off the belt, we touched it and left it there to go back on the belt and back on the plane.  Instead of allowing us access back to the secure lounge for takeoff, we were directed out of the secure area and into the general area of the airport and asked to hurry to get through the security check since the airport was busy.  Are you kidding!  Going through security, I was "wand"-ed and even asked to remove my belt.  Lisa was stopped for having 2 lighters in her carry on, the maximum allowed is one.  Hmm, she didn't even know she had 2 which meant that these lighters didn't seem to be a problem in Halifax, Heathrow, Paris, Bordeaux, Gatwick and Heathrow again.  There was also a little girl in line with her dad.  She had a drink in her hand, Fruitopia or something.  She was told to take a drink while they watched (I guess to ensure it was a drink and not - I don't know - paint thinner)?  Oh, they also opened the box (and not very carefully I might add) in which Air Canada sold us the duty free Bailey's just before we deplaned.  The security girl checked it closely, took it out of the box to make sure it wasn't opened. 

What a make work project.  I have heard of this before but now I have seen it all.  Off the plane, luggage.  Employment.  Luggage back on, do a security check of the people that you just kicked got off the plane.  More employment.  Luggage back on the plane.  More employment.  Anyway, I digress.

Back on the plane we were told it would be a few more minutes - they couldn't get the luggage belt to work and so it would take longer to put the luggage back on the plane.  Load by hand, call in the maintenance people.  Even more employment.  So what could have been a 30 minute stop to drop off several people turned into a 2 hour stop - when we were just an hour or so away from home.  Laughable, very much so.

Safely landed in Halifax, my dad was there to greet us and whisk us home.  I drove.  Much slower than I did in France.

What an adventure, we can't wait to do it all over again.