Nothing easy about Easy Jet!

Hello Everyone, I've got much to tell but using this French keyboard is trying my patience. Anyway, I got a couple hours sleep my last night in Madrid and departed the hotel at 6:30 am, hailed a cab from the Grand Via and headed to the airport for my 9:30 am flight to Paris. After finding the Easy Jet ticket counter I checked my bag and was told my flight was delayed a couple hours...I protested and said I had checked the flight status at 3:30 am and nothing was reflected...she discussed with a colleague and then said the flight was not delayed...I felt good about pushing back on her lack of knowledge and headed through security. I did note that my flight did not have a departure gate listed on the monitor but I was early so that shouldn't surprise me...right? Anyway, 9:30 came and went with no gate, so bottom line is that we didn't depart until 12:30 with a cockpit crew from Stanstad airport in London who never offered any explaination for why we were delayed...except to say that they were sorry for the delay!

Anyway, I paid extra euro for "speedy boarding" that allowed first boarding on the aircraft and I was the only one so I walked down the stairs and boarded a bus first followed by everyone else and of course when we got plane side it was doors open and a rush to the plane...ugh, euros well spent! I was exhausted from lack of sleep and was asleep after take off. Upon landing in Paris we taxied for awhile and then stopped along the taxi way and the seat belt sign went off and people did the mad dash for bags and the doors...but then the plane started moving again...I was thinking WTF is going on here. The stewardess kindly asked us passengers to sit down and fasten our seat belts and then the pilot stated we had a little further (a lot further) till the gate and he mistakenly turned off the fasten seat belt sign...yeah, what the hell is going on up front jackass. On thing that I did see from Ryan Air was they had every passenger place their carry on bag in the size-wize container to see if it fit...that is a novel idea and I wish we in America would do more than have them stuck in the corner of the boarding gate used for a coat rack..maybe it would help eliminate some of the bursting-at-seams crap people bring on board now.

I collected my bag and hailed a taxi for the trek into Paris and my hotel for the night. After a 68 euro cab ride and feeling I should have attempted the train I arrived at the hotel and checked into the room that had been smoked in for the last 200 years! I immediately set out and did some scouting of the area and shopping. By the way, traffic in Paris in the afternoon was ridiculous and can only be described as chaos without mass death on the streets. For such a civilized city it was everyone for themselves and somehow all the moving pieces meshed together...somehow?

This keyboard is kicking my ass so I'll write more about meeting up with Francis and our first and second touring days. All is well..more later. Oh, and Easy Jet gets an "F" in my book. Au Revoir!