234 Edinburgh-Geneva (Easyjet): Was lying in bed with my book and a bacon roll, enjoying the rare luxury of a lunchtime flight, when I got a knock on the door at 8:30am. Turned out to be the plumber who was possibly coming on Tuesday, definitely Wednesday, to service the boiler. So I clearly wasn’t expecting him on Thursday. It then transpired that the boiler was humped and had to be disconnected pending replacement, so no hot water or heating in the meantime. It looked like I had picked the right time for a long weekend in France…
On arrival at EDI it seemed plenty of other people had obviously had the same idea. I thought I had avoided the bulk of the easter weekend traffic by travelling on the Thursday, but the terminal was mobbed with an annoying number of families. Equally annoying was the construction work going on at the retail space just after security, meaning the water fountain had disappeared. I headed to Boots to buy some water to fill my bottle (as it was the cheapest option), only to find it was closed. On closer inspection no, it wasn’t actually closed; the shutters were down with a tiny gap and large hastily-printed A4 signs saying ‘Cash only – sorry’. So it was next door to W.H. Smith, which was of course mentally busy due to the near-closure of Boots. Almost fifteen minutes queueing for an extortionately priced £2.89 bottle of Evian, just so I could have something to drink on my journey to…Evian. I then discovered a new water fountain had been installed next to Gate 11.
The flight to Geneva was pleasant as always, (it’s one route where I’ll always make sure I have a window seat), and I treated myself to a can of Rekorderlig en route. The border was pleasantly quiet on arrival, and I was quickly out and headed to the train station to be met by someone in a rabbit costume accompanied by SBB staff handing out little packets of complimentary Lindt chocolate eggs. Not sure what the reason was but I made a few passes to collect as many as possible, (who wouldn’t?). There was no need though, as there were plenty more on arrival at Gare Cornavin.
One thing that had confused me on my previous visit to the Haute-Savoie last spring was the fact that I didn’t seem to be able to book the Leman Express trains directly from Geneva, which had meant making my way into the city, taking the tram across the border to Annemasse and catching the train from there. Turned out that the hack for this was booking the train through the SBB app rather than the SNCF one, (no, I don’t know why you book a French train through Swiss railways either), meaning I could get on the train at Geneva this time. And a good job I did too, as it was standing room only by the time it reached Annemasse.
235 Geneva-Edinburgh (Easyjet): After a brief wander around the city in the sunshine, I arrived at GVA to find it as busy, chaotic and expensive as ever. I knew there was no water fountain here, so I had no choice but to pay for some water, this time splashing out 3.90CHF for more Evian, (no irony there). And then found that the airport had finally gotten around to installing a water fountain.
Once onboard my return flight I discovered I’d had the ill-luck to be seated in the midst of a group of twenty-something male twats who had obviously been off to a skiiing holiday in the Alps, (possibly paid for by their parents). One overheard comment about how excited they were about the new Greggs on Byars Road was enough for me to adequately judge them, and I kept my headphones on all the way home. EDI was pleasantly quiet on arrival with no queue at the border. However, my passport did not want to be scanned and I had to go to the desk. But since it’s almost reached the end of it’s ten years I wouldn’t be surprised if the chip was playing up; it only has to last three or four more trips anyway. No big delay though, and I was soon on my way home to see if my new boiler had been installed during my absence as promised.
Spoiler alert: it wasn’t.
Gill 9A 