The 3 week Sept extravaganza – which turned into a 2 week trip in June and no cruise! Day 14 - Going home!

Sat 25 June into Sun 26 June

This morning we had our last late start of the trip and we didn’t have much packing to do as we had only opened one of our bags deliberately.

We left the room just before 11 dropping our bags with Bell Services on the way, we decided to venture into the shop at Jambo for the first time.

We also headed out to the viewing areas to see what the Savannah was like at Jambo. I think the selection of animals is better at Kidani (but not on Pembe obviously), but we did see some birds being fed which was good.

We had our much-awaited lunch at Sana’a, having had to cancel our dinner reservation last week, and we checked in and got a window table which was great.

We attracted 2 birds (outside the restaurant) who appeared to be labelled 12 and 14 and they stayed watching us for most of our meal which was amusing.

We of course started with the bread service, which we amended as always to only have naan breads as we don’t like the 2 other breads and they were happy to accommodate.

In a poor choice I chose the vegetable curry with chicken and Rob had a burger which came with chips (not fries).

My meal was really tasty but far too big and Rob thought he was getting fries. With hindsight we should have shared the potjie inspired choices as it would have been a perfect size for lunch.

Rob managed to find room for the African Triple Chocolate Mousse but I was stuffed. Another dessert fail on my part!

We walked back over to Jambo where I bought a few last treats and we retrieved our bags before requesting a Lyft, which caused a tiny issue as it kept saying we were at Kidani – we messaged the driver in the app and all was fine.

The car arrived in 6 mins and cost just under $60 inc tip for the trip to the airport which we thought was very reasonable.

We were flying home Upper Class so had an easy check in – it was literally just inside the entrance which was convenient.

We dropped back our Visitor Toll Pass tag (and have since received our deposit back as expected) before getting in a 20 min + queue for security which was rubbish as always. I don’t understand why it is always such a long queue or why they insist on being so grumpy / rude.

We took the monorail across and then headed straight to the Delta lounge which was busy but we found seats and were able to relax while we waited for our flight.

The food selection was definitely not the same as the Virgin lounge in London but we found some pretzels, crisps and soft drinks while we waited.

Our flight left just about on time, we boarded and had a water (still declining all of those glasses of fizz). Once we were in the air I got my seat turned into a bed (as did Rob) and we settled down to sleep so I’m afraid I can’t comment on any of the food.

We landed at 0645 and were able to quickly leave the aircraft where we were then faced with a massive line for immigration (how does that happen both ways?)

Luckily despite its’ length the line moved reasonably fast and in a miracle I got through the e-gates first time (it’s always a battle as I have to remove glasses and balance everything).

We arrived a few days after the luggage chaos and there were bags everywhere (not piled up, all neatly arranged in rows) and our bags took over an hour to start arriving (apparently due to a tech issue).

We assume due to being in UC our bags (all 3 of them) were literally the first to arrive.

We practically ran out of the baggage hall as we were worried about getting lynched by the other passengers (joke).

We debated heading straight to the car park but decided to stick to our original plan and so we followed the signs to the revivals lounge.

Slightly awkward getting into a lift (there were many people waiting) but we found the entrance and were greeted by a nice host who asked if we would like showers. We did indeed and he allocated us bathrooms to use which was so much nicer than a normal arrival.

Nicely refreshed we sat down to order breakfast, we both had similar choices to when we left 2 weeks earlier.

Feeling like we were normal people and wearing fresh clothes (such a novelty) we dragged ourselves away from the lounge and down to the bus stop.

In a pleasant surprise it was warm out so we waited for our bus in relative comfort.

We got dropped off at our awesome parking space (right next to the bus stop) and crammed all of our bags into our little Skoda.

We started on our journey home and the range looked like we could get home without charging so we passed our normal chargers near Fleet feeling confident.

Well that didn’t pan out so well and as we approached Amesbury we thought we had better stop and top up…..which would be fine had any of the chargers been available. We could have waited but we were impatient so carried on hoping we would make it! (There are no other chargers between Amesbury and our house) 

Well that lead to a very stressful end to our journey as our miles left were decreasing at a faster rate than we were travelling.

We coasted down lots of hills, managing to get a little bit of charge through the regeneration and we turned off the A303 earlier than normal which reduced our mileage and the roads are slower so uses less charge.

We arrived home at 1230 and practically floated onto our drive with about 6 miles left! Such relief!

We did still have a little nap when we got home, but I got out onto the Peloton in the afternoon, did 11 miles towards my challenge and then 15 miles for the next 4 days managing to finish my 300-mile challenge by 30th June!