Tuesday
– Our trip to Iceland began at sunrise. Well, we actually left the house around 7 but for some of the family members those two are synonyms. And for that reason, while we were in the bus on the way to the city (to change for the airport bus), half of the group were still looking at the world with mole eyes.
When we arrived at the connection bus stop, the city smog has already woken up even the sleepiest head. Overall mood rose quickly – the Iceland trip had started! My youngest was about to travel by airplane for the first time and infected the others with his excitement.
We caught our 10:30 flight in comfort, calmly found our seats and spent the flight to Manchester filled with expectations (did I mention that we flew from Vienna to Iceland through Manchester, with sleepover?). And even though the route was relatively short, when we arrived we already felt the sneaky presence of exhaustion. So we grabbed something to eat to revive our orientation senses.
It worked, kind of, because in a few moments we were holding train tickets in our hands. The issue arose when we realised that the train was leaving in three minutes and we were standing in the middle of the train station like Harry Potter trying to find the platform 9¾. That´s when another Harry-Potter-movie-like character walked past us. She was wearing a long heavy coat and a witchy hat covering her silver hair. And obviously, when you see someone like that, you have no choice but to approach them and ask for help, right? The magic lady really did help us to find the platform in time. We didn´t even have to run into a wall 😊.
After we got off the train, we were welcomed by typical English weather – cold rain. It was actually kind of refreshing after the heat wave we´ve just experienced back at home. After a while of being lost in the labyrinth of Manchester streets, we successfully found our apartment for the night.
We did a bit of room exploring, which was furnished in a 70s style. It was nice and satisfied even the taste of the more high-maintenance ones. Then we set off to explore the city.
The rain didn´t die down at all, and even though it was no hurricane, it didn´t make for the best conditions for tourists. But we all saw a Chinatown for the first time and we even ran into a random music festival by the town hall, which brought a little colour into that rainy afternoon.
We all had enough after all the bus, airplane and train travelling, and the rainy walk. We quickly bought some groceries and headed back to our apartment to get some rest before our trip to Iceland continues.
This article is part of a blog series about our visit to Iceland.
