Mediterranean Iconic Shores Ocean Cruise

Day 2: Friday, October 31, 2025 - Travel, and Istanbul, Turkey

The day's statistics:
-  Weather: low 60s
-  Steps: 10,382 Linda; 11,187 Steve
-  Miles traveled (approximately): 2,350

We tried - and were a little successful - in getting some shut eye - even if it were only three or so hours.
At 2:30 ET (probably about 7:30 or 8:30 local) we had a light breakfast of a yogurt, granola, and a fig bar.

"Land-ho!" Somewhere...

This looks like the Thames.

We touched down at 7:37.
After taxiing and deplaning, we headed to the dreaded Heathrow security. Our luck has not been great with Heathrow security as we were significantly delayed when returning from the Passage to Eastern Europe Viking River Cruise.
With all the kidding that Linda did regarding my mustache trimmer, it turns out the tables were turned and this time it was HER fault that we were delayed in security. A sealed bottle that was less than 100 ml, had to be weighed for some reason. This didn't cause any issues like it did last time, though. By about 8:40, we were through security.

Time to make our way to the next gate for our connection.
So far, so good.

When we arrived at the boarding gate, and I talked to the agent about the fact that our seats were in the same column, but not the same row (one of us was seated behind the other). I played dumb and asked the agent if we were in the same row and she said "No. One moment." and handed our tickets to another agent. A couple minutes later the other agent approached me and asked "Do you speak English?" "Yes." "Are the two of you able-bodied people?" "Yes." "OK, this is a nearly full flight, but I put you in the emergency exit row. Is that OK?" "Certainly!" WIN!
At 9:55 the call to board began, and eventually our group.
At 10:30 we moved. Then sat.
Eventually, at 10:50 we finally took off.
Merely 10 minutes later we were given a snack of biscuits and water. Coffee was available for a fee...

While traveling, we played some Pinochle, and saw some interesting sights of the landscape - and another plane with chem-trails - out the wind that don't exactly render in photo as well as they did through the tiny plane window.






At 1:58, we landed and were at the gate at 2:12.
We made our to the luggage reclaim area.




When we finally arrived at the baggage carousel, we found a number of our fellow travelers as well as a Viking represttnative that was helping the travelers by pulling any luggage with a Viking tag on it. Nice, thanks.
When the bags stopped coming up, there were three or four pairs of travelers that didn't have all their luggage. Including us - we had our two carry-ons, but only one of our two checked bags... Greeeeat.
One couple didn't have either of their checked bags and their air-tag (a digital tracker they put in their bags to track its location) indicated that the bag was still at Heathrow. Apparently one of the batteries in one of the tags died so they were only getting a signal from one.
The Viking rep motioned us to go to the Customer Service office to talk to them about where our bag was. We were told it was tagged (by the airline) to go to Cappadocia, where we were going to be the next day. In fact, BOTH of our bags were thusly tagged, but for some reason we got one of them. One other traveler had a similar situation in that their bag was also being sent to Cappadocia. But alas, the luggage was in a holding cell and we were asked if we wanted to have it now. Yes, yes we did. About a half-hour later, our luggage appeared. YAY!
Those that had luggage that was still on sight all got their luggage. The couple with their luggage in another country was out of luck for the time being.
The group collected their bags and headed outside to the shuttle bus.

We had about an hour drive to our hotel. As it was dark and the bus was moving, photography was difficult and I only got one decent shot.

Upon arrival at the hotel, we made our way to the Viking reception area where were were given a letter with instructions for the next day, and how to check-in.

It was a nice room.

Before we left home we had the plan to only use the carry-on luggage, and try not to have to open the checked luggage until we were actually on the ship in four days. We'll see how that works out for us...
Having spent the entire day traveling, we were rather tired especially considering how little sleep we got on the red-eye flight. And we had to get up a little early the next morning too.
We washed up and went to sleep.

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