Day 1: Departure & Chaos

Left Hong Kong early in the morning at 0735 on board Qantas flight no. QF 029 to London Heathrow.

Before boarding in HKIA

The on-flight entertainment was impressive with large variety of latest blockbusters available on demand. Qantas has been very considerate handing out snacks and fruits during the 13 hours flight. Managing to get some sleep, the 9862km journey passed swiftly.

In-flight breakfast

Somewhere in the northwestern part of China

After getting through the immigration though, things started to become chaotic. We didn't know how to get to our hotel at Gatwick (for one night before we head to Iceland). Know that a single express coach costs 20 pounds, we chose to take the Tube to Victoria then train to Gatwick using a family pass. But it turned out that the pass does not exists, so we took a coach which took us 1.5 hours to finally arrive at Gatwick. So basically, the whole day was spent on traveling, from Hong Kong to London then to Gatwick. This is what you are going to experience if you are not traveling with a package tour. So if you are like me, who like everything in order and under-schedule, better not go on your own. Not a very impressive start I would say. Let's see if things are going to go on track tomorrow.