You cannot be serious!

Flying for me always seems to be enormously stressful. Over the years I have learnt to accept that something will inevitably go wrong no matter how prepared or early I am to the airport. This is usually my fault (like managing to fly to Addis Ababa when I was supposed to fly to Nairobi – not an easy thing to do I can assure you) but occasionally ....very occasionally, it is totally out of my control.

I have been sleeping really badly over the last few days, religiously waking up at 4am, after having some very strange dreams about either cycling naked or crashing spectacularly down some Alpine ravine. So this morning was a considerable lie-in at 5 am.

A 20 minute hike to Clapham Junction with my now ridiculously over-laden and ‘excess-baggage-ready’ suitcase I was unhelpfully directed to the wrong platform to Gatwick by a ticket collector more asleep than I was. 30 back breaking steps up...I realised it was not the right platform. Back down..round...another hike up...only to see my train slowly pulling out of the platform...not my ideal ‘Brief Encounter’ moment! Half an hour later I was on the next train – getting in to Gatwick with 5 minutes to spare. No panic whatsoever!

After doing a very good bit of blagging with the check-in girl about why my 36kg bag was a tad over the 20kg limit, I sailed through passport control without a rubber glove in sight. There I met Sandy and Davinia – encouragingly both complete novices like me, and both attempting the whole Tour. A short and very empty flight later we arrived in Rotterdam.

Well I certainly did.....my bag, with every conceivable bit of kit, clothing and nutrition required to get me through the next 3 weeks, had not.

A series of emotions then followed... first total disbelief...then anger (still raging now!)...then a massive panic to track my life down and get it back before it was too late for the 7am start tomorrow. A lot of very irate calls later and I seemed to be getting nowhere. Then out of blue, whilst taking in the gangland concrete sights of Rotterdam (we had even been warned by our taxi driver that we were in a rough area), a ridiculously laid back Dutch girl rang me up to say they had found my bag, that it was still at Gatwick and it would be on the next flight over getting in at 11pm.

'Fantastic news!' I said...

'Well they may always forget to put it on the plane again?' she replied.

Not helpful...not in the slightest!

The rest of the afternoon was spent working out worst case scenarios ..who I could borrow kit from if the same backward Gatwick baggage handler screwed up again, and why I ever thought flying with Transavia airways was a good idea. It’s a really bad idea! Tragically it’s a rule I already know and should have applied. Always, always book a flight with an airline you have heard of. Probably why I ended up in Addis Ababa courtesy of Yemen Air!

I now wait...safe in the knowledge that England are playing Algeria tonight...that should lift my spirits?

...oh god Cappello has put Green in goal again!