Fan-Air flight FL2357 to Reykjavik / Rio

The red carpet was rolled out as I boarded my private jet, arm-in-arm with Juan.  You'll notice I'm flying on Fan Air, my own airline, with its motto "the Real Mile High club".  After take-off, I usually instruct the pilot to do a few low swoops over London, just to ensure the Royal Family and any B-list celebrities who live there are aware of my presence in the skies above them.  On one occasion, I even instructed that the contents of the toilet-tank were jettisoned over Tower Bridge, no doubt adding a new dimension to the phrase "a shower of shit".   We sometimes try and do a double-loop south in order to release the second and third toilet-tanks, as well as the bilges, over Crawley and Croydon.

Fan-Air Flight FL2357 to Reykjavik /Rio empties its toilets over Tower Bridge in silent
salute to the Royal Family and the B-list celebrities of Londinium.

As we jetted north in preparation for our own New Year's celebrations, Juan and I enjoyed rare Latvian quail eggs served in lapis lazuli egg-cups with a platter of Beluga caviar, preserved in little yellow tins from the 1930s, eaten with pickled beetroot, cream cheese and blinis.   As I've said before, I enjoy eating Beluga caviar from the delicate contours of Juan's highly-muscled abdomen, placing the black sturgeons' eggs on his undulating, lower six-pack and gobbling all those lovely salty balls down.  It drives him wild.  Well...what did you expect - after all - my airline's motto is the real Mile High club!

Not for paupers: Latvian quail eggs. 

These Fan-Air private jets are quite amazing; apart from their top speed of 1800mph, they even have their own luxury bathroom with a bath-tub, replete with a French antique crystal chandelier and a surround-sound entertainment system.

 

As we reached 36,000ft, I wallowed in a warm bath of champagne.  Yes, a bath of champagne.   That is to say, Krug 1928 - bottled in 1938, and costing a mere $21,000 per bottle; it takes 22 bottles to fill the bath-tub up, and it leaves my skin feeling baby-soft, a curious ritual similar to Cleopatra who insisted on bathing in asses' milk.  It was a nuisance for the hand-servants who had to heat the champagne in fish-kettles to a reasonable temperature, but well worth the lovely feeling!

First stop for our New Year's celebration was Reykjavik, Iceland, where, upon landing, we were helicoptered to the Blue Lagoon: a natural geothermal spa with steamy waters, black rocks, and wild views of moonscapes, all part of a lava formation.
























Gleðilegt nýtt ár is Icelandic for Happy New Year and we enjoyed the high spirits and revelry.  The waters are heated to 98–102°F so whilst the air is bitterly cold, it's a sensuous experience to bathe here for a few hours.  After our meal of smoked salmon, hakarl and vodka, we were being helicoptered back to the private jet, and no sooner than you can say "Eurozone crisis" we took off again this time on a 6-hour flight to the party capital of Latin America, Rio de Janeiro. 


Does it sound like a flagrant waste of money jetting up to Iceland and then down to Rio?  Yes!  Well good!  You see, Fanny likes decadent extremes: to party in snow-bound Reykjavik and then, 6 hours later, to have the privilege to be in sub-tropical Rio, it's the ultimate way to celebrate the New Year, as well as being the envy of the newspaper-reading world!  Lady Gaga has to do with the Hamptons (so yesterday!).

We touched down at 3pm on New Year's Eve and went straight to Ipanema and Copacabana beaches where I donned a tiny turquoise swimsuit about the size of a shoe-lace, also known as a "micro bikini" - it's a local custom to wear such tiny garments in this neck of the woods.  Juan, being a native carioca, felt at home on the beach.  We partied on the soft sandy beach with some beautiful local couples until the fiery sun sizzled into the sea and we then headed for a string of exclusive nightclubs to celebrate Réveillon, the Brazilian-Portuguese expression for the dawn of the New Year.   

I love the Latin spirit of partying - such fun and absolutely no requirement to wake up in a pool of your own vomit the next morning in a urine-stinking police cell, as is customarily practiced in England every New Years Eve!


After a wonderful further five days spent at the Copacabana Palace (an elegant Art Deco hotel, looking like a 1920s wedding cake), we touched down in England again after a marathon 10,000 air miles!  

 
Owing to bad weather, we could not land the jet at my private landing strip in Buckinghamshire and so were diverted to the blot on the landscape that is Heathrow, known to some as Thieves' Row, to others as Stalag 9 or the Russian Front.  No red carpet on the tarmac here!  Landing at Heathrow Terminal 2 has the same shame-factor as admitting you've caught crabs.


Such was the inconvenience of being forced to land here, I really couldn't be bothered changing and instead walked through Immigration and Arrivals in a 'Barely There Black' micro-bikini which I had bought in Rio:

I do hope the UK Border Control were impressed by my generous show of sun-kissed flesh!  Certainly, the whole terminal-building was full of audible gasps and finger-pointing, presumably at the bare cheek of my arrival.

All this New Years' travelling has made me realise that I need to re-new my passport before I embark on my 180 days Around the World trip - it expires in just 13 days!