After having had a few hours in Valletta it was time to get back to the airport.
I appear not to have any photos of the bus other than this one, but I was the only passenger as apparently most people stay in hotels before getting a flight rather than sit excitedly at an airport terminal.
Back at the airport and the temperature was suitably moderate.
I’m still not entirely used to seeing Norwich as a destination at airports, but there it is at 05:50. The departures area was very quiet, but there were several late incoming aircraft, so the arrivals area was actually relatively busy. The buses here don’t run throughout the entire night, so that might have been an expensive taxi fare for some passengers.
Another flight at 05:50 was to Rzeszów, which is the only one of the top twenty cities in Poland by population size that I haven’t been to before. This is clearly an administrative omission which I will need to address.
#goodbyemalta….. I always take a photo of this sign when leaving Malta so I thought that I’d continue the habit.
I had time to visit the La Valette Club lounge.
It’s one of my favourite lounges and they certainly make an effort with the presentation.
The lounge wasn’t busy at just after 03:30, which is perhaps not a surprise. I appreciated everyone else’s willingness to stay in bed.
Spacious and quiet, with plenty of power points.
The food was plentiful and looked suitably appetising.
Oooh, pea cakes! These are known as pastizzi tal-piżelli and they are my highlight of this lounge. I don’t normally have hot food for breakfast, but there was some burnt bacon so I grabbed all of that. The lounge were fortunate that someone with my particular bacon requirements had turned up.
Pepsi, non-alcoholic beer, bacon, pea cake, banana, orange juice and an espresso. How lovely.
I don’t take photos of the border control area as it’s neither permitted, nor particularly interesting. It was poorly managed here and my flight was boarding before many of the passengers had got through the border processes. The signage told passengers on the 05:45 to go through border control, but it didn’t tell passengers for the 05:50 to Norwich until relatively late. As I was on a non-Schengen flight I went through the border at the same time as the Glasgow passengers, which was fortunate as I saw numerous stressed passengers.
Safely at Gate 12 and I wasn’t there long before boarding commenced.
The Ryanair aircraft was EI-EBZ, which I haven’t been on before but that’s not entirely surprising as I don’t take many flights with this airline.
The steps that fold back into the aircraft, I always feel the need to comment on these.
The seating Gods had given me a middle seat, but it soon became apparent that this flight was only around half full. This meant that there was never a need to give me a middle seat, so I moved to the aisle. Wizz Air doesn’t tend to do this in my experience, if the load is low then they don’t seem to fill the middle seats. One element I’ve never quite understood, which is unique to Ryanair in my experience, is that the seat numbers don’t line up properly with the seats. Several passengers found themselves in the wrong seats, although the crew resolved the issue promptly.
And safely in Norwich Airport, on time and with no issues.
The walk to the shed that is the airport terminal. It’s a large shed I admit, but a little decadence wouldn’t go amiss. The flight was £15, which is cheaper than the train from Luton to Norwich, so this was a handy arrangement. I didn’t have any complaints about the flight, the crew were friendly, the aircraft was clean and there was no unnecessary drama.
And that was the end of another trip. I walked back home, via a little refreshment break at the Whiffler pub for several coffees. I felt it important to adjust gradually to the change in coffee prices.