All ready to go with the family, grandchildren included, all over home ensuring that we make the 11.41am train from our local station (Seven Hills) for our journey into Mascot airport. The cynical ones amongst you may venture to suggest that the children were keen to see us move on, but the warm hearted readers (with whom I can identify), feel that this send off just reflected a cohesive family. This thought being reinforced when Rylee and Noah (grandsons) requested, “ have a good time and don’t buy us too many presents.” Cody (yes, another Grandson), indicated that he was to be a happy recipient of “.....as many we can bring home”. I think I have alliances with the former. Grandma just gave the mandatory hugs that the boys love and enjoy: while Grandad needed to check his bank balances. Still I am sure some of the sporting memorabilia over in the UK will find their way into the hands of the grandchildren. With 2 grand daughters, as well, I am sure that Grandma will have something in mind. “Flash that plastic”.

Off we go, with daughter Jonelle driving us to the station for us to train it to Mascot. A quick and efficient way of getting into a very congested area. A quick transition through immigration, although Fred did her usual and was randomly selected to be “padded down” and checked for explosives. She tended to smile through the former and waved goodbye to her blonde male attendant.

Our flight QR 907 was ready. A full passenger component with a 14.5 hour flight into Doha. Qatar certainly feed and hydrate you well. One of the joys of travelling is to see how others live and carry out their everyday activities. Interestingly it was a somewhat unusual experience to see constant reminders for passengers to remain in their seats while praying. Obviously one gent couldn’t read, as he came and took my blanket ...... without even asking ...... and proceeded to undertake his daily prayers in the aisle next to Fred and Myself and then meekly folded up the blanket and returned it to me. “Nice to be of service””, I remarked. With no emotion, he pivoted and returned to his seat elsewhere in the aircraft. Mark that down as a one-off. Upon reflection I thought that having a few allies of supreme influence is probably not such a bad thing. I took a picture of the constant reminder offered on the plane. It is part of this chapter for your perusal.

Into Doha in the early hours of the morning with the expectation of getting into the Al-Maha lounge for a little bit of R and R. Easily done with such charm massaged upon my Middle Eastern “cousins”. A couple of hours here with the odd viticultural product will do very nicely, thank you very much. Fred had travelled well, but neither of us getting much sleep. Fourteen hours is a long haul: probably worst than sitting through one of my (former) Principal’s prognostications from the pulpit.

Qatar (“cat-ah”, for those domestically challenged folk), is officially a State: a monarchical State with a very high per capital income mostly derived from oil and gas. It has the highest GDP per capita (no not according to the law of Parno, but by the UN). Generally regarded as the “black sheep” of the Arab world with its more progressive western approach. It is also the base for the world wide Al Jazeera network which I occasionally click to when Fred starts to manoeuvre for my participation in domestic duties. “Homework for our upcoming trip”: necessary one would think. 

Qatar is also the site for the 2022 Football World Cup. You may remember the controversy a few years back when they won it, albeit doubtfully one would venture to say. Apparently, lots of brown paper bags were purchased in Qatar that year.

Qatar sacked the British about 40 years ago and have since been independent. It is literally just up the road from Abu Dhabi and Dubai. This small 36 kilometres square nation of about 2 million people, seem to be doing things OK. Interestingly, our flight path avoided these neighbours. Is this the result of not being “friends” ? Our path was somewhat like “Melbourne via Darwin”.

Off to gate 3A and onto the brand new A350 - 100 jet. This was a little more spacious and probably 80% full. Geoff our travel agent had looked after us very well again with our aisle seats and plenty of leg room. Movies and monitoring our flight being the major distractions. 

On time, our Indian captain (Aloki) getting us into LHR (aviation talk for Heathrow) at 07.00 hours. Fred and I a little “zonked” with no sleep etc for some 24 hours. Immigration at LHR has a lot to learn. We were lucky to get through in just under an hour. Those slower to the gates would have been there for a couple of hours. Fred has still yet to apologise for me insisting we sprint to the immigration area. Yes, I did win: Fred came in a creditable second. Well done.

Onto the London Underground with our Australian acquired “Oyster card” (how did they select this name. Sponsored by “Shell”, or did it apply to the need to “shell” out big bucks to get on the Underground ?) with an hour or so trip to Paddington station and the Adare Hotel not far away. 

The Adare Hotel in Sussex Gardens seems to be in a more  up-market part of the suburb and nearby to the famous Hyde Park. Just across from this, being the central parts of London, the Palace etc. more of these follow of course. 

 We were determined to keep going as Fred had organised our trip to nearby Lord’s Cricket Ground in St John’s Wood .......just about 20 minutes walk from here. More on this in the next chapter.