Q is for Queue - a line.
I spent a significant chunk of my 48 hours "doing Wimbledon" in queues of various fashions. Let us see what they were: queue for plane boarding pass; queue for security; queue for boarding; queue for Wimbledon (this one gets 10x the queue points since I slept in this queue); moving queue for Wimbledon (it gets a second mention since I walked 2 miles in this queue); strawberries and champagne queue; ice cream queue x 2; water queue x infinity; bus queue; hotel check in queue; boarding pass queue; security queue; boarding queue; immigration queue; bus queue.
Q is for Queue - a very very ginormously long line. And my new favorite word because it's bloody brilliant!
Friday June 30 I had a flight booked to fly from Dublin to Stansted (the furthest airport from London's center that's still a London airport) and get in at 9pm-ish. This would mean given the getting to the center of the city and then out the other side would take me 2 hours. So I should be in line by 11pm with my sleeping bag, Pringles, Crazy Creek Chair and water bottle. Did you notice the convenient use of the word "should" in that last sentence? I did.
Instead, my flight was delayed 45 mins on the ground in Dublin before we could board. We then sat for over an hour on the plane waiting for London airspace to clear enough for us to take off since they knew otherwise we'd just circle over London. I was a bit apprehensive since I knew that the Tube stops running at 12:30am and that was my planned route to the grounds. I managed to get into the terminal at Stansted London at around 11:30 and had to catch a 45-50 min train down to the center of London next. Excellent. Done. It's now 12:20am Sat morning and I'm in Liverpool Station in the center of London asking if there are any more trains running in the Tube that night. A lovely woman told me there would be one more Westbound train running although it wasn't going where I wanted - but it did get me a whole lot closer. I went to the platform.
On the platform with a lot of random people (and a lot of drunks) I stood apprehensively checking my map trying to figure out where I would exactly end up in the city if I got out at the various stops on this line. I also was trying to figure out if I was going to chicken out and get out and find a hotel for the night rather than the line - knowing I still had an hour to go. And the train didn't come... and it didn't come... and it didn't come.... Finally, the couple standing next to me went to the "Help?" phone and dialed the terminal attendants who told us that they "couldn't find the train, but were trying to locate it". Ummmmm - how does this happen exactly? How do you lose a train? Especially a train in underground tunnels that has an electronic tracker? Was Liverpool Station one of the points on the London Triangle where tube trains disappear? 10 minutes later they announced that the last train was cancelled and they were closing the station and we should please leave. WHAT? Oh, and the reason that they were canceling the last train was that it had hit a person at the previous station so was out of service for the night. Ok, someone was definitely having a worse night than I was.
Plodding towards the stairs with the herd, I grabbed my map to figure out where I was and try to figure out what I was going to do - I honestly had no idea. The couple next to me was muttering about something and I asked them a question about the best way to get to point X (I don't remember where it was - but it was a place I'd located that looked like it would get me on my way to a hotel - I was giving up.) However, a young man next to me told me about the "night buses" and they were the best way to get around London at night. He asked where I was going and when he found out Wimbledon, he offered to escort me most of the way there since he was heading home and was taking the bus himself. We started talking about tennis and music (he was heading home after playing with his band that night) and had a grand ol' time walking to the bus stop. My lovely tour guide in the middle of the night in the middle of London was a 19 year old musician who lived with his parents named Amir. Very nice guy. We got to our first change and he showed me where he was going on the map and where I was going on the map (same line, different stops - mine was further than his). He also showed me how to read the various schedules. The bus came....... and the driver wouldn't let me on because I didn't notice that this was a place where you had to pay in advance. My little tour guide Amir continued home and I was stuck somewhere in the middle of London at a crowded bus-stop alone at 1:30am.
Can't go home, nothing to do but continue. Thank you Amir for teaching me how to read the bus lines. I grabbed the next bus going to the area of Wimbledon and stared intently out the window trying to read the bus stop signs with frustration (it was dark, I was tired and they were all in random places). A drunk got on who was also going to the stop I was (I'm a good eavesdropper) so I started watching him and the signs. I got off at the stop and there I was in the midst of a dark town with no one around wondering where to go. I couldn't figure out where to go - but after looking at every possible sign and talking to a woman sitting on the street corner (don't ask how that happened - I was too tired to notice) I found the long long queue of tents and sleeping tennis fans. I walked a mile (calling my mother on this walk to reassure her that it was all fine after all and that her daughter would be sleeping on the street that night - the reassurance every parent wants to hear in his/her lifetime). And finally, I came to the end of the queue, got my queue number and my "A Guide to Queuing at Wimbledon" booklet (a souvenir I will keep for as long as possible). It was 3am. After giggling at the length of the line (I was #804 in my line - only the first 750 are guaranteed the option of getting tickets to a showcourt) with the woman Tamara sleeping next to me in queuing sidewalk slab #805, I passed out for a whole 2 hours of sleep.
They woke the line around 5:30am to get everyone to pack up. Those of us "towards the end" (not at the end anymore - by the time I woke up at 5:30 the last person in the queue had a card numbering over 1000) were to be ready to move in 15 mins as the moved the line forward. Mind you, I didn't realize this at the time, but we had a 2 mile queue walk in front of us since they no longer form the queue at the gates.
We rambled up to the place where we would sit for an hour while the stewards got the ticket situation sorted out. From 5:30am-9:30am in the queue, I met some great friends who I'd see all the rest of the day at Wimbledon. We were the middle-of-the-night queuers: we weren't as insane as the Centre Court Queuers (those who were at the front of the line and would be guarenteed the option of Centre Court) and we weren't as ambivalent about our tennis watching as the Clean Queuers (those who arrived that morning and got in the queue after the 2 mile walk). We were a merry band: me, Tamara - the Italian from London, Jo & Yvonne - the Scotts, Nadia - the Aussie, and a merry band of Aussies and Brits whose names I can't recall. When we sat down at 7:30 for our "break in the moving queue" we got out our various stashes of snacks and breakfast foods for our version of a continental breakfast: Pringles (my contribution), jelly beans, cherries, strawberries, crackers, some chocolate-y M&M like things, and other junk foods. Breakfast at Wimbledon has an entirely different meaning for me.
Finally, I found out I would be able to purchase tickets for Court 1 if I'd like. Now, the lineup for the day's matches included what would turn out to be some amazing matches: Agassi v. Nadal, Mauresmo v. Perry & Roddick v. Murray. Mauresmo v. Perry was on Court 1 - so I took that. And I soon found out that buying queue tickets for Wimbledon gives you absolutely the best seats in the house - equalled only by those given to the family boxes. I was sitting right at the net line in the front row of the ground level on Court 1. It was absolutely unreal.
Around 10am we got into the grounds and our gang of sidewalk queue sleepers decided who was going where - I ended up being the only one going straight to "the hill" (aka Henman Hill or Murray Mound) because since I didn't have a Centre Court ticket, I wanted prime hill seating to watch what would eventually turn out to be Agassi's last Wimbledon match. I didn't make it to the hill till 11am due to the queue system. This was honestly the most amazingly organized queue system I have ever encountered. Maybe it's the name? Or maybe it's the queuing brochure?
I sat there watching people, the monitors and taking in the 30C weather. It was marvelous - absolutely brilliant. I struck up a conversation with a lovely mother/daughter pair behind me who were having a bottle of champagne and some strawberries before lunch and their venture onto Centre Court to see the Agassi match. Hearing that I was so envious of them for seeing Agassi, and the fact that I was a rare individual - an American Agassi fan (it wasn't a lack of Agassi fans, it was a lack of Americans) in the crowd - they offered me a glass of champagne. Mmmm... Then I went to get real food for lunch and came back only to befriend the massive table to my right on the top of the hill. We all had prime viewing spots - and suddenly after eatting my lunch they're making a champagne run and ask if I'd like to get in on this - sure! I'm at Wimbledon - the place where the Brits joke that the hoity toity people go to drink champagne and eat strawberries all day. So I grabbed us some cheese and crackers to add to our strawberries and champagne feast as the match of the day started: Agassi v. Nadal.
The fans at Wimbledon are a different breed of sports fans - respectful and ridiculously loud. They are devoted and happy and nice people. I had an amazing time cheering, watching the match, talking to my newfound friends, drinking, eating, lathering on sunscreen (it was disgustingly sunny) and just having a merry time.
I saw Nadal beat Agassi; I saw Mauresmo beat Perry; I saw Murray beat Roddick. I caught a glimpse of Venus Williams practicing before her match on one of the back courts and I saw a game of Martina Navitalova playing. I was in T for Tennis heaven.
At the end of the Roddick v. Murray match, I was exhausted. I'd slept only 2 hours in the past 40 hours - and I had to go find my hotel. So Tamara (who I'd spent a good chunk of the day with) helped me find the tube station and I made my way back up to Stansted Airport since I was staying at an airport hotel that night for my Sunday morning flight out. This time, the transport was much easier and I made it to the hotel without more than a few average queues.
I flew home Sunday after some more queues on an airline I hope to avoid in the future (they were delayed 2 hours getting me back to Dublin - not a great track record - and they had the rudest employees I've ever encountered on an airline).
So, my W for Weekend at Wimbledon was absolutely superb. Would I do it again? Of course! Like you have to ask? You and I both know I'm crazy - especially since next time I'd get to the queue earlier in the day to enjoy more of the queue evening picnic and party atmosphere and to have a chance at Centre Court tickets. But even if you're only going to be a Clean Queuer and aren't insane like me and aspiring to be a Centre Court Queuer, I recommend going to Wimbledon if you ever have the chance. Amazing tennis - amazing atmosphere - just a great time!
No comments:
Post a Comment