I knew our holiday was off to a bad start when it refused to start at all. Our flight to Lanzarote had already been delayed an hour before we’d boarded, bringing us perilously close to the baby’s midday nap. Could be worse, we thought, if she sleeps on the plane, we could get two hours’ sleep out of this three-hour flight.
After an hour on the runway, we were still being informed that take-off was 20 minutes away – this would be the same, entirely stationary, 20 minutes we’d been chasing for the previous 60. Secondly, instead of her usual two-hour nap, our baby decided on one of those express sleeps, the kind that parents share tales of round campfires, the kind that leave your sweet little cherub as wide awake as a soldier roused by gunfire, happily screaming with the plane still 20 minutes from starting its three-hour journey.
