After 3 months in the planning I am finally on my way to the Middle East. Thanks to the new security measures in place at the airports the local news is recommending people get to the airport 4 hours in advance.
As I am just sitting around the house waiting for my 5:30 pm flight to Frankfurt it isn't a big deal to take off early. Around 1pm the taxi arrives to take me to DIA. It is with nervous anticipation that my journey begins. I am not nervous of the tensions in the Middle East more just general nervousness associated with going on vacation.
I check in at Lufthansa and am sitting in the lounge within 30 mins of arriving at the airport. So much for the new security measures, basically the only difference was they checked to see that I had a boarding pass before letting me into concourse area.
The flight to Frankfurt is pretty uneventful and only about 1/4 of the business class seats are occupied. I manage to get a couple of hours sleep and arrive in Frankfurt about 11am.
I decide to take the train in to Frankfurt as I have never been to Germany before and have 10 hrs before my flight to Amman. It only takes about 20 mins to get to the city centre and I wander around downtown Frankfurt in what looks like the touristy section for a few hours. Frankfurt seems fine but not particularly exciting. It could also be that I am extremely tired at this point that I am not that impressed.
After a quick lunch of a beer and a brat I head back to the airport. Even though I still have 5 hours to kill I am too exhausted to do much exploring so I head back to wait/sleep in the Lufthansa lounge for my 9:30pm flight to Amman.
Finally it is time for my flight and I board the plane. I feel a little strange, as I appear to be the only Non-Arab on the plane and am also the only person in business class on the plane. Oh well, just means more room to myself. Luckily I manage to sleep most of the 4 hour flight and wake up somewhere over the Mediterranean.
I land in Amman around 2:30am and by time I make it through customs, get my luggage and grab a cab to my hotel and check-in it is almost 4am.