2017 Travels with Gerri - Security and a Bit More
As you can imagine, and might be wondering about it, the security is very tight here in Europe. We did our normal packing from LA to Heathrow, putting all our 3 ounces and less liquids in 2 Ziploc bags and at LAX we put them on the belt for x-ray. It was carry-on stuff. All went fine.
On our connecting flight from Heathrow to Prague, when we put the same liquid Ziploc's on the X-ray belt, they came out of the x-ray machine and they were sent to a diverted spot along the belt and we did not get them. Turns out, in Heathrow you can only bring liquids in one bag, and only the size of a small sandwich Ziploc. Of course I had two big large Ziploc bags. So we had to wait our turn while all the others diverted bags were checked one by one.
The woman in front of us had a large bag and security took out each piece of clothing one by one and set it in a basket. When they were finally done with her after 10 minutes, they told her she could go with her stuff. But instead of picking up her stuff and going to another area to put it back, she stood in the same spot and put it back one by one. This held up the line for the others waiting their turn to be inspected. Finally Art, who was pacing, asked the inspector couldn't he tell her to go elsewhere to re pack her bag and security said he was not allowed to ask her to move. You can imagine how Art took that statement!
Finally, our time came for our liquids to be inspected. But because the liquids were wrong they also took our iPads and my jewelry. This took forever as they looked at each little bottle I brought (but just a cursory look at the jewelry). They then took our iPads over to a machine where they left them for about five minutes going through some sort of an inspection process. Heaven forbid they could've taken our iPads first and let them do their thing in the machine while they then came and inspected our liquids, sort of a concurrent occurrence going on. But nooo. Those of you that know Art will not be surprised to know that his impatience level was rising. "Why do they have to go through all this"!? I was actually much more pragmatic because let's face it, London has had their share of terrorist problems so inspection levels were rising everywhere. I was happy that they were taking extra precautions. They then repacked the liquids in two little bags and asked me if I was traveling with anyone else because Art would have to take one bag. Our stuff barely fit in these two little bags but we made it.
ow to the ship. Each time we enter the ship we have to show an ID card that they swipe and our picture flashes on the screen, as well as we have to put our backpacks or whatever else we have on the conveyor belt x-ray. When a bus arrived at the dock to take us to town we got on it and off we went. Today that changed. We've been in France the last three days. But today the bus has to stop before it enters the ship area and be fully inspected inside and out and then it is allowed to roll in for us. When we return on the bus we have to get off before we get to the ship area and go through a X-ray at a remote site while the bus is fully inspected in and out, then we get back on the bus and drive to the ship area.
We figured some terrorist thing must've occurred in Europe somewhere. We don't watch the news or pay much attention, which is kind of nice, but we just read there was a terrorist attack on the Champs Elysie so France must've raised their terror alert.