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We enjoyed a nice breakfast at the Grand Hotel before catching a cab to the Arlanda Airport, about 25 minutes outside of Stockholm. On the way there we were reminded how close Uppsula is to the airport…actually closer than Stockholm. Both Margaret and I have spent a lot of time there as Dale sold one of his companies to a Swedish company that is headquartered there. Margaret used to fly there once a month!
The airport was a ghost town, the shared First/Business Class lounge was fantastic and we boarded our A319 British Airways jet plane to Heathrow and arrived 2 1/2 hours later without delay or incident.
The layover in Heathrow was a couple of hours…which turned out to be good because Heathrow is a BIG airport and our connecting terminal was a bit of a jaunt from where we arrived. We didn’t have to clear the UK Border again (whew) because our bags were checked all the way to LAX. Margaret even got in a little duty-free shopping, finding some nice Gucci sunglasses at a nice duty free price. But the best part is that the British Airways lounge was the best one we’ve ever seen. Incredible wine selection, great food, espressos/lattes, US power outlets, lots of newspapers/magazines, etc. The boarding area was very confused and crowded but we managed to weed our way through at early boarding and boarded our British Airway 747-400.
Neither of us has been on a 747 in a while, so we were surprised at the configuration of their Business Class seats. Each of us had a pod of sorts which had protective sides and allowed you to recline into a complete flat position. Quite nice! Luckily the woman in the “cubicle” with Margaret was traveling alone and offered to change seats with Dale. The outside people have some privacy but the inside pair end up sitting/laying next to each other. Perfect for the two of us. We watched a movie (This Means War…very funny Reese Witherspoon movie) on Dale’s MacBook (with a nice big 17″ screen) sharing the sound with our Bose noise suppressing headsets. The flight was nice and smooth, the food and wine was good and we even got some sleep! Margaret actually slept at least 8 hours of the 12 hour flight. Not too bad.
We arrived into LAX a little late but still made it to our hotel in Manhattan Beach in time to have a late dinner with our youngest son. It was a great way to wrap up the trip. Well, sort of wrapped up. We still need to fly home tomorrow to our puppy and kitty cat. We’ll be happy to have our feet on the ground and they’ll be happy to see us we’re sure.
747 Gallery:
