Thursday 18th March

We are due to fly out of London this afternoon for a long weekend in Istanbul (Turkey) and John was due to go back to work. We were going to spend a few hours with Nicky before we left for the airport. This would be the big test for Nicky - just her and the baby with nobody else home to help. It was going to be an even bigger challenge because John had a dinner function after work that he had to attend. Apparently he had been invited to an Australian-British friendship event with Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh.

We had our bags packed before breakfast at the B and B - another great breakfast to start the day. This morning I met Jackie's husband, Jalal - our co-host at the B and B.

They told us that the borough they live in is called Barnet whereas Hampstead (where Nicky and John live) is in the borough of Camden. She said the real estate values here are much lower than in Hampstead. However, Barnet is a Conservative electorate whereas Camden is Labour electorate (she used the term "socialist").

When Jalal saw us leaving with all our bags to catch the bus to Nicky and John's place, he kindly offered to drive us there instead. He has a nice old Mercedes with left-hand drive.

Nicky was feeding Amelia when we arrived. Apparently she had quite a good night last night.

We had booked a hire car yesterday again to pick us up from Nicky's place to take us to Heathrow terminal 5. The car arrived on time and we arrived at the airport at about 1:45pm - plenty of time for our 4:20pm flight. Terminal 5 is new and it shows because it is well laid out, clean, bright and efficient. For example, the security area is more spacious and systematic than most other airports where the security checks of carry-on bags are usually crammed into existing areas.

The plane had to wait on the tarmac and ending up taking off about half an hour late. Although the plane was a 767, it looked old - it must be close to a refurbishment or retirement. I think I've been spoiled by the business class flight to London on Swiss Air. Nonetheless we were grateful that we had booked for today because it meant that we avoided the BA strike.

I'd seen the film they were showing (Blind Side) on one of other flights on the way to London. On that trip I didn't get to see the end of the film because that turned it off when were coming into land. The same thing happened today. Maybe I'll never find out how it ended.

They managed to make up time on route. When we landed, the driver that the hotel had organised was waiting for us. Luckily the hotel reception is manned 24 hours per day because it was close to midnight Istanbul time before we got there.