Ah, the joys of travel

The joys of travel used to include getting there. These days I’m not so sure how joyous it really is.

The Australian leg

It’s been a challenge but we’re on the road. We’ve tried to do the Budapest to Bucharest cruise before. The first time was in the Days of Covid, where APT was forced to cancel the day before we were due to drive down to BNE to catch the plane.

So when Trump suddenly decided to start a war with Iran it was a bit déjà vu. We were supposed to be flying with Emirates via Dubai. When we heard the news we didn’t muck about getting in touch with our travel agent, we found another flight through Europe. It cost more (of course) but what the hey. We’ll have to fly with Lufthansa through Frankfurt, probably my least favourite airport in the world. But at least we’re going. BTW, Emirates cancelled the flight so we’ll get our money back.

Just to give us a farewell kick in the pants, a tropical low dumped 160mm of rain on our house in two days. It caused some serious flooding around the district so we left early to avoid any delays. I’m writing this at the service centre a stone’s throw from the airport, killing time before we check the car in for its long-term stay. It cost us $10.20 for 2 cups of tea – ie a cup of hot water and a tea bag each.

We bought lunch from Maccas. I don’t know why we bother. It’s always awful – my cheeseburger was a soggy bun with a wafer thin burger, a slice of American cheese, and a large squirt of tomato sauce. Peter had a fillet o fish which wasn’t any better. (I think MacDonalds is only known as Maccas in Australia.)

I hope the food’s better on the plane.

Off on a jet plane

These days the joys of travel tend to include business class. Sitting up for many hours hoping to get some sleep no longer appeals. Sure it costs but you can’t take it with you. And flying with Singapore Airlines is usually a good experience. Things went relatively smoothly, reasonable food, reasonable bed although sleep was intermittent.

And then we reached Frankfurt, my very favourite airport /sarcasm.

Remember, we’re on a very long international flight, 12 hours for the leg from Singapore to Frankfurt. And that was after the 7 hour flight from Brisbane to Singapore. We weren’t exactly bright eyed and bushy tailed.

They put the plane on a hardstand. That means no air bridge. You’re out in the airport back blocks, you have to climb down a set of very steep stairs and you’re ferried to the terminal in a packed, overcrowded, uncomfortable bus. But it gets better. Before we got to the bus we were met at the door (at the top of the stairs) by three coppers demanding to see our passports, FFS. We couldn’t have got on the sodding plane without a passport. But what the hey. Here you go sport, knock yerself out. And it was raining.

Such a difference from when we flew Qatar. We parked at a hardstand there, too. But they had a special (civilized) bus there for business class passengers, where everyone had a comfortable seat.

Back in Frankfurt, we queued up to go through immigration.  They had the automatic, digital stuff but it wasn’t open. So all of us were processed by two (count them, 2) desks. It took at least 5 minutes each, sometimes more. They took our pictures, asked quite a few how long are you staying blah blah blah.

Then we were let loose into the wilds of the airport. Fortunately we were in the correct terminal. And we found one of Lufthansa’s business lounges without too much difficulty before we went to find our gate for the flight to Budapest. We were expecting a hardstand so we weren’t disappointed. At least it wasn’t raining.

However, I will say Lufthansa served an excellent light lunch during the 90 minute flight.

So here we were in downtown Budapest. We ventured out for dinner, finding a nearby restaurant for a light meal, Hungarian goulash soup.

The following day was bright and sunny, so breakfast and a walk to the river were on the agenda. We met our good friends Col and Sandy and mooched around Budapest for several hours. The weather was glorious and the river looked a picture (see above). All of us were soon carrying our coats. We chose one of the many restaurants in the area for a pleasant lunch. And this evening we’ll find ourselves a place to have dinner.

Tomorrow we’ll be boarding our cruise ship.

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If you’ve missed any of the posts for this trip, go here. Europe 2026