It Is A Beautiful Day

6am Thursday and in the words of my beautiful 4 year of niece Ava " it's a beautiful day and the birds are singing" and they really are. Slept with the window open (in a real bed) and the early morning light coming in over and through the new leaves in the spring trees in the garden 3stories below. The sounds of a couple of italian ladies talking below discussing the morning, well at least thats what i think as the words spoken were soft and calm. A cool

breeze moving the soft white muslin curtains embossed with geometric and a leaf pattern, Sandy is sleeping but Im on a buzz still, we both have managed a couple of 4 to 5 hours sleep 1st night from  Sydney to Tokyo and the 2nd yesterday between Tokyo and London  in the middle of someone's day the plane was turned into night mode once we had a bite to eat "BA"style of course! Now that was style, (so now the Qantas frequent flyer points are nearly all gone it will be B/A or JAL for me from now on it) we had our own little "apartment" we'll 2 seats in the middle of the plane so no windows which was OK but we were facing the back of the plane, never done that before so at take off and landing that was hmmmm a bit different and a tad disconcerting at first as the G forces start to work a treat. So back to our little flying "apartment" so cool both of the seats did the button control movement into a flat bed and the arm rests disappeared so it was more like a little doubleish bed. We even had little walls to our "apartment" 2 entrances so that if one wanted to sleep the other would not be disturbed, they did think of every thing!! our little apartment was 1.480 x 2.126mm and the walls were 967mm high (yes yes Sandy did question  me bring my electronic tape measure but you never can tell when it will just come in handy) so back to the "apartment" 2 tv,s and the best of the English staff (hosties) that money could buy (well frequent flyer point could get us), mind you the staff could not be in the apartment  at the same time as the tenants hence the wall height they could just lower in as needed or requested as many food drops and drinks as needed by the stranded tenants, again so cool, pip pip hooray to the English is all I can say. Our "staff" allowance for the flying apartment was many as we had to be looked after at every whim! As you all know Sandy is sooooo high maintenance!!!! so they had to take it in shifts to make sure we were stuffed to the eye balls if we so desired and heaven forbid we were not going to dehydrate. (Tetsue a Japanese looking man) Was one the first of the staff sent to entertain us and he had the best English ascent may be from Twotcher  we had a choice of Reds from France or Australia, "amazing" and well done to the Aussie wine industry to be the only other drop available on that BA flight.

No offence to the Aussie wines but we were to be flying over France that day so the french drop won the peoples choice for our apartment!! But no respectable flying apartment dwellers could start the flight with out a champagne, silly  me, one needs to be in the right state of lubricantion prior to the plane even leaving the ground! So a Boizel Grand Vintage 2004 should help just fine.

So the first!!!!! starter of the flight came out and as pretty as a picture on the plate was a pepper salmon with a Japanese style yuzu dressing (oil +salty + lemon+ black sesame seeds) yum and moist, with a glass of (white food matched wine) Chateau de Chantegrive "Cuvée Caroline" 2011,  Graves, Bordeaux equal parts Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon, barrel fermented in new Allier Oak. It was the creamiest white we have ever had will be looking for that one back in Auz.

Main was a grilled beef with herb butter and Madeira (sherry) sauce, great flavour butttttt hmmmm note to self, beef kept hot in the galley not such a winner. But the winner was it was matched to a Chateau Marzy 2008 Pomerol, Bordeaux, nearly all "merlot" (well thats what the wine list said so not sure of the other variety blend) and yes it was rich with stewed plum flavours (but as for the Dundee cake, coffee, earth!!!!! and the dried meat undertones I was please they we're subtly) but we did have to have 3 glasses to see if we could find those hints of flavour, but we wont need to locate that one back home, a Conawarra red at this point still does it for us but we do still have 202 meals to see if that is still the case or 303 if we count breakfast!!!! Your terrible Muriel