So after months of planning and organising, it turns out there are some things you can’t plan for, like flight cancellations! On my way to the airport on Sunday night, I got a txt informing me that my flight had been cancelled. We got to the airport and were told that it was due to technical problems with the plane, and then had to queue for 2 hours to try and get rebooked. They found 1 leaving at 7am the next morning to frankfurt, from there I would have to wait 4 hours for a connection to Mumbai, and then I had to book a new flight to Goa from there. I was arriving in Mumbai at 1.30am and the 1st flight to Goa was at 5.15am. So much for my plan to fly in the night so I could sleep through the flight, arrive in the early afternoon, and then beat the jetlag! I was now flying through the day and arriving 1st thing in the morning so will have a full day ahead with no sleep. That was the only option though if I wanted to make it in time for my airport pickup window.
I was offered a hotel overnight and given the choice between a Premier Inn or The Hilton. As if that is even a question! My parents stayed over with me so they could see me off in the morning. By the time we got to the hotel and had some food, it was after 11.30pm. I booked my new flight from Mumbai to Goa, emailed my new arrival time to the volunteer organisation, and then went to bed.
I managed around 2 hours sleep, and then we woke up at 4am to head to the airport. I said goodbye to my parents, I’ll see them again in just 10 weeks so it wasn’t too bad, and then I headed in and got on the flight. The 1st leg to Frankfurt wasn’t bad, during the 4 hour changeover, I was very grateful for my Kindle which I had loaded up with movies and TV shows. The flight to Mumbai was just about bearable. I had been switched from British airways to Lufthansa after the cancellation and there was no entertainment except for a small TV screen which was too far away to see. The food was decent though as far as plane food goes. Arrived in Mumbai, and the guy at immigration informed me that I couldn’t stay in India for the 6 weeks I was intending to as my visa expires before that. I was under the impression that my time there started when I entered, turns out that it started when the visa was issued so I only had a few weeks left as a result of applying too early!
Then had some drama finding where to go for my connecting flight, for some reason it was a domestic flight but was leaving from the international airport. After being sent back and forth between the 2 airports, I was left with just over an hour to catch the flight but made it through just on time luckily and was finally on the last leg to Goa!