So this ends our stay in Europe ☹ and as you have read the hot water didn’t work for the last two nights we were in Paris and to top it off we couldn’t get a shared airport transfer to the airport, they were all booked out! We recommended if you using one in Paris, make sure you book at least 3-4 days in advance, so in the end we had to pay for a private transfer, while nice was a bit more than we budgeted for but we got to the airport which is really all that matters in the end.

I could say some things about Charles de Gaul airport but I won’t, as they aren’t nice, it need a huge overhaul, as that’s all I’m saying on the matter. Even Perth airport is paradise compared to it in terms of facilities. First off the two British Airways employee’s were overworked, as BA only have 2 staff in Paris and no supervisor to look after them, people push into line, and Lisa and I got accused by a Frenchman that we pushed in when we finally got to the check-in counter when we hadn’t. Though he was right about others, with some old American guy hassling Lisa as he was trying to push in and about the time it was taking me to check us in at the counter. It did take awhile, as the French lady was telling me all about their poor working conditions and that they should be the ones on strike not Air France, I told her I agree totally and starting tomorrow they could strike but not today! The guy kept whinging they (couple) were going to miss their flight. And it turns out he was on our flight that was leaving in 2 hours!! We saw them on the plane and the BA lady gave them shitty seats ☺ So from the time we arrived it took almost 1 ½ to check in, and the queue wasn’t that long!

We get our tickets and hang onto the stroller as Isabella was asleep (you can keep your stroller till you board the plane) and went to get a drink, unfortunately we don’t drink coffee as that was cheap while our soft drink was very expensive. So off to the gate we go, and when we get there, there was a mass of people exiting it, it turned out that after most of the passengers had gone through the security checks, they moved the gate two over, so everybody had to exit and go through security a second time and then the flight was delayed, not a good morning so far. This was a worry as we had a connection in London to make for Singapore. Kane checked with the staff and they said “the flight will arrive at 10.30am”, 45 minutes before our next flight. A quick hop across the channel to London and a fantastic view of central London as we flew parallel with the Thames over old London town. We arrived at Heathrow at 10.45am!! and moved as fast as we could, Lisa running with Isabella in her arms and Kane with the hand luggage through the Heathrow airport. As we reach the queue for another security check the airport staff push us to the front of the queue, as it now 10.55am, a simple check you would think as we have already been through one in Paris, no, they wanted us to remove our shoes, jackets and other extra items, we take them off and Lisa goes through the scanner with Isabella and something beeps!! I have to wait while they frisk Lisa, Isabella had been put on the floor and was enjoying the excitement, and then the lady says she needs to frisk Isabella too! Luckily Isabella hasn’t done smuggling 101 yet and they are done with Kane not being frisked and straight through. Its after 11am now, Kane says bugger the shoes lets go, grabs all the bags, shoes and jackets etc and starts running after the airport lady in his socks with Lisa following close behind with Isabella. Then we leave the carpet area and enter the main mall area and nice shiny floors, with Lisa shuffling as fast as she can; luckily it was only a few gates down. We get to the counter at 11.05am and they are still accepting people, so we catch our breath. Hand them our boarding passes and find we and the other passengers from the Paris connection have been booted; one lady had a first class ticket (1st class was now full!). So they try to find us seats, the lady gives us our seats and Kane checks and sees they aren’t bassinet seats and points this out, there is some discussion and Kane politely telling the lady we’re not flying 13 hours without a bassinet, in the end we got the right seats, considering we had prebooked these seats before we left home. To top it off after all of that, the plane left almost an hour late as they had a missing passenger, unable to leave as their luggage was on the plane, so much for all the rushing. The flight to Singapore was excellent and Lisa loved the ice creams Qantas handed out on their flights.

So we arrive in Singapore, go through immigration and wait for our luggage, and wait and wait…. It didn’t make it! Here we are in Singapore with only our carry-on luggage. So we lodge our missing luggage claim and Qantas give us some money for compensation which was great as we had to go buy Isabella some food as it was in the main packs, luckily for us we had her bottles and spare clothes/nappies in the hand luggage. It turns out there is a Supermarket in the level 2 basement of the airport and it had half a wall of baby food, go figure it must happen often.

We get to our hotel, which is nice, and they give us an upgrade to a very nice room with a great view and a massive king size bed. The hotel has a nice pool, spa, gym and is in a great location in central Singapore near Clarke Quay. It’s a pity we only had the clothes we had on, no stroller or baby carrier for Isabella, so our plans for Singapore changed to relaxing in our hotel room and having a warm shower. There are some photos of Singapore taken from our hotel window, luckily we have been before and the visit was more to relax and that’s all we did as it was quite warm outside.

Well two bags turned up at the hotel about 10pm that night, Lisa’s and the general bag, the lack of bags made going to the airport a bit easier and shared a transfer with another couple we meet on check out on the same flight. At the airport Kane went to check on the status of his bag and the stroller for which he had to go get a police pass for to go back through customs, but no word of them unfortunately.

The flight home to Perth was bumpy, actually the bumpiest we have had for the entire trip and Kane got food poisoning from the fish and was very sick later that night. What a way to end the trip! all we can say we’re glad all this happened on the way home. So we get to Perth and Mr Holt thankfully is waiting for us to drive us home. We found out the stroller had been sent to Melbourne and finally arrived at the house 9pm that night and Friday night at 2.30am we hear banging on the front door, it was finally Kane’s bag. Kane did mention to the delivery guy that he could have waited till morning to deliver it, but Qantas policy is to get it to the customer ASAP in case there was important medication for the passenger in the bag.

So our short jaunt across Asia to Europe and back comes to an end…

Singapore Web gallery