Our journey began at Brnik Airport at 7:30 a.m. We chose this hour because we didn’t want to be late if there was any traffic, and because most of the guys had never flown before. After the bag drop, we headed to security, where I had to ditch my 300 ml 6-in-1 shampoo bottle because I forgot to pack it in the big bag.
I realized how really small Brnik Airport actually is and how few gates there are. After we boarded the plane at about 9:00 a.m., we were excited to go up in the air. I was really nervous because the last time I flew was in 7th grade.
About an hour into the flight, the stewardess kindly greeted us with a warm breakfast, which we ate very quickly (the portions were very small). We finally arrived at Istanbul Airport, where we drove on the taxi runway for about 20 minutes because it is so large. We saw the cargo departments and many warehouses before we finally arrived at our gate, which was fortunately quite close to our next gate.
We got a very small glimpse of Istanbul Airport, which in itself was massive, before boarding our next plane to Helsinki. On the menu for lunch was either chicken and rice or pasta, and I decided I was feeling chicken more that day.
When the plane was supposedly landing, it really didn’t seem like it because there was a lot of fog in the air. And then it hit us — the asphalt about 10 meters below us finally showed itself and we landed instantly. I really have to hand it to the pilot; he handled it very well considering the conditions on the runway.
During the drive to the gate on the taxi runway, we saw the beautiful weather that had hit Helsinki about a day before: mushy snow, cold winds, no sunlight, and fog as far as the eye could see.
After that, we boarded the train to Mikkeli, which had a special dining coach with a café and some tables, which we checked out. Quite impressively, they even had draft beer. After the two-hour train ride to Mikkeli, we took a taxi to our apartment, which cost €18.30 even though we had a lot of luggage.
I think the journey home is going to be pretty relaxing since I now see how easy it is to navigate the airport and everything else.
