A Grumpy Old Man’s Trip To London
Well, it has not been a good start to the day. I am currently sat on the 07.13 Virgin Pendolino inter-city train from Crewe en route to London Euston. It is 07.35 and we have just left the station. This means that we will be behind all of the still-on-time trains with the likelihood that we will be further delayed. They seem to work on the principle that it is better to have one very delayed train than lots of slightly delayed trains. But, that seems like a very strange principle upon which to run a train company. Whatever happened to punctuality?
As ever, they haven’t thought up a decent enough reason for the delay with which to share with the paying customer. And I have paid. Through the nose. £275 for a First Class return! Extortionate. It is cheaper to fly to London from Manchester but, unfortunately for me, it is still less convenient.
Crewe station is just ten minutes from home, and, after a couple of hours in which you can stretch your legs, read a paper, hopefully complete the Times 2 Crossword (although I am struggling with 5 down at the moment) and the Killer Su Doku, and maybe do some work, you are delivered to Euston station. Then it is just 15 minutes by Tube, unfortunately, before I am delivered straight to the office alongside which is alongside Waterloo station. Door to door in two hours forty five minutes if I am lucky. But, as with today it would seem, I am rarely that. Lucky.
Manchester Airport, however, is a good (or bad) 45 minutes drive away itself. With the heightened security you definitely now need to be there at least one hour before the flight is delayed. And you have all that hassle with your luggage and your clear plastic bag for your toothpaste and eau de cologne (Euphoria for Men by Calvin Klein). And, Heathrow is just not as convenient for central London, although the Heathrow Express is much better than the old crawl in on the Underground.
At least when travelling care of Sir Richard Branson, the food is generally OK, and the tea, coffee and alcoholic beverages (not at breakfast of course, unfortunately) flow much more abundantly than they do in the air these days. I am currently sipping tea, having already partaken of a grapefruit juice and a passable sausage sandwich with brown sauce. The bread was a little dry though.
And, there is generally more to see out of the windows. And, every so often, you get to meet a celebrity. Those of you who have read my earlier postings (Celebrity Spotting) will know that I had a very enjoyable chat with Pete Waterman once and nearly had sex with Sarah Lancashire. The more I think about it the more I realise that she wanted me. And, these new toilets in the Pendolinos are so much more accommodating than in the old days. Another opportunity missed.
I have also seen Patrick Moore, the male chauvinistic stargazer who recently complained about there being too many senior placed women running the BBC, and, the diminutive and foxy news reader Sian Williams recently. Which reminds me, I literally bumped into Suzannah Reed, the other foxy if midget morning newscaster with the BBC, when buying my lunchtime M&S sandwich at Waterloo Station last time I was in the Smoke. She was quite startled and seemed a little spooked when she realised that I had recognised who she was. She was dressed all in white with a very long flowing coat. She had very white face make-up and very red rouged lips and cheeks, which made her seem even more alarmed. It was probably my fault. Living in the countryside and frequenting only small towns such as Sandbach and Holmes Chapel these days I get quite alarmed by the crowds in the big cities. I seem to have lost that knack of walking through a crowd without bumping into people. It can feel quite claustrophobic at times.
Well listen to me extolling the virtues of Virgin Trains. Mr Branson are there any jobs going in your marketing department?
On the downside, things can get a bit tense on board train. Especially in the Quiet Zone. Of course, the Quiet Zone is hardly that. Quiet. You still get the normal train announcements, and that strange beep beep noise as the Pendolino seems to tilt precariously when taking a bend at speed. You still get passengers chatting, passengers snoring and the like. No, things get tense when some jumped up self-opinionated, self-important oik decides that the “No Mobile Phones” sign does not apply to him and proceeds to have a loud if disjointed conversation. Conversations are disjointed because the signal quality is so poor, conversations require a lot of redialling after thirty seconds of “hello, hello, can you hear me?” or, “I’m in a tunnel”). These noise abusers can often be found wandering up and down the carriage to annoy as many people as he (it is invariably a he) possibly can. Or they stand at the end of the carriage, in the vestibule as Mr Virgin calls it, next to the loos. They seem to think that they are less annoying there. They are not, it is even worse listening to the self-important oik on his phone with the carriage doors sliding open and then shut again, and again, and again, as he triggers them with his proximity.
Things can also get tense when the staff forget to reserve pre-booked seats or all reservations are cancelled because of a train cancellation requiring two or three trains to be merged into one. Pandemonium. Even on “normal” days, people ignore the seat reservations and assume that just because they are a party of eight they have the right to sit next to each other. I can feel myself getting tense. I shall move on.
Unusually, the train staff this morning are not Eastern European. They seem to be Scousers. So, they are as good as Eastern Europeans. Homegrown Eastern Europeans if you like. But it is unusual. Have you not noticed how, in the last couple of years or so, the service industries of our great nation have been overwhelmed by Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Albanians and the like?
I learnt at the weekend of a very successful restauranteur and property developer who only employs Bratislavans. He does this because they are reliable, polite, and punctual and have excellent language skills. So, nothing like Scousers then. He pays them the going rate so they are not cheap.
Every London bar, every hotel reception, every waiter and waitress, every shelf-filler in Waitrose, every bricky, carpenter and electrician. They are all Eastern European. Crewe has shops selling “Polish Food” now, and in parts of the country road signs are now displayed in both English and Polish. The influx of devote Poles has now resulted in the Catholic Church becoming the biggest religion in the country again.. Henry the Eighth must be turning in his grave.
No, it is the Australians I feel sorry for. And the New Zealanders. They used to have the monopoly on the London bars. I can only assume that all the Kiwis and Australians are now serving drinks in Warsaw, Prague, and wherever the capital of Bratislava may be. Although at least a couple of our Antipodean cousins could be found at this weekend’s Home & Garden Design Show in Tatton Park, selling Magic Shammy Leathers. How the Empire has fallen.
The train now seems to be crawling along. I don’t think we’ve even reached Nuneaton yet. Now, where’s that girl with the tea……….
Showing posts with label planes trains and automobiles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label planes trains and automobiles. Show all posts
Wednesday, 9 May 2007
Tuesday, 10 April 2007
More Leg Room Please!
I’m back. Did you miss me? We had a wonderful time. I am even a little brown. And, I know that you don’t want to hear another word about my holiday, do you?
But, how do the airlines get away with it!?! This was my first experience of economy-class long-haul. I know, I know. I’ve been spoilt and I should count myself lucky. But, seriously, how do they get away with it? I have seen sheep transporters on British motorways that have offered more wiggle-room than we had. Air France, shame on you!
We flew out from Paris Charles de Gaulle/Roissy . The French give the airport two names just to confuse you and to make it quite, quite clear that they are different. The airport is known everywhere in the world as Charles de Gaulle. Everywhere except France that is. CDG is even used as the international shorthand for the airport. You will get CDG on your baggage tickets. But, as soon as you land it is “Bienvenue a Roissy!” This is just some sick Frenchman’s pitiful attempt to disorientate you; to make some weary traveller panic that he is in the wrong place. Shame on you Charles de Gaulle. Shame on you France. Shame on you Air France.
We flew out on a 747 Jumbo. C and I were in row 25, in the window and middle seat. C likes the window seat. I am not sure why. You can hardly see very much in the dark and they make you shutter it for most of the time on long-haul flights. Except for take-off and landing of course.
Apparently, according to my mate Smithy the pilot, they dim the cabin lights and insist on having all windows open (well the little blind thing up – I haven’t actually been on a plane with windows that open) so that your eyes are adjusted to the ambient light. So that you can see better in the event of something happening. Something like crashing, catching fire, or being hit by a terrorist’s shoulder held surface-to-air missile. To be quite frank, that is the kind of thing I would rather not see coming!
As readers of my previous blogs will know (see the Planes, Trains and Automobile entries), I prefer an aisle seat. My motives for this are, well, many and varied but on long-haul the main ones would be a) you can get out of your seat whenever you want to for toilet or booze without disturbing those weird folk that tend to be placed in the seat next to you, and b) the extra leg room. You cannot imagine the relief of brief opportunities to stretch a leg down the aisle in between trolleys.
But, on this occasion, C got her window seat and I got stuck in the middle. A petite Vietnamese lady sat in the aisle. She was about five foot nothing and her legs dangled off the end of the seat without reaching the floor. So, the aisle seat with its leg stretching opportunities was clearly wasted on her! My legs, however, were parted either side of magazine pocket and my knees wedged firmly against the back of the seat in front of me. Now at six feet and an important half inch tall I am hardly a midget, but nor am I a giant. This leg room was frankly pitiful.
I was wedged in and there I stayed for the better, no, the worse part of eleven hours. The twee Vietnamese lady to my left popped a couple of sleeping pills during the safety demonstration, which for some strange reason does not include any reference to the fact that being completely comatose in the event of an “ on-board incident” can clearly damage your health and the health of the poor sod wedged into the seat next to you. Me. She was out of it. In the event that this plane went down, C and I were going down with her!
Those little bottles of water that they give you on long-haul flights aren’t to prevent dehydration you know. No, they are designed to be emptied and then used as a personal relieving vessel (piss pot) by people wedged in the middle seat and who cannot get out to go to the loo.
It is impossible to sleep well when your knees are stuck firmly against the seat in front of you. It is impossible to sleep when the dainty Asian lady next to you keeps wriggling in her sleep and banging her arse against your armrest. Sleep would not come, despite the best endeavours of the Air France trolley dollies who plied me with alcohol and tried to induce slumber via the in-flight “entertainment”. I use the word incorrectly. It was not entertaining. Normally, the movie “A Night at the Museum” followed by back-to-back National Geographic documentaries, in French, would be enough to bring a coma on. But not when you are wedged in the middle seat of an Air France 747. Not when you have lost all feeling from the knees down. Not when your knees are bleeding because they have chafed against the seat in front. Not when your next-door neighbour keeps rubbing her bum against your elbow. Not when your thoughts are filled with the prospect of deep vein thrombosis and the growing awareness that your bladder is full!
Please Air France. Can we have more leg room?
But, how do the airlines get away with it!?! This was my first experience of economy-class long-haul. I know, I know. I’ve been spoilt and I should count myself lucky. But, seriously, how do they get away with it? I have seen sheep transporters on British motorways that have offered more wiggle-room than we had. Air France, shame on you!
We flew out from Paris Charles de Gaulle/Roissy . The French give the airport two names just to confuse you and to make it quite, quite clear that they are different. The airport is known everywhere in the world as Charles de Gaulle. Everywhere except France that is. CDG is even used as the international shorthand for the airport. You will get CDG on your baggage tickets. But, as soon as you land it is “Bienvenue a Roissy!” This is just some sick Frenchman’s pitiful attempt to disorientate you; to make some weary traveller panic that he is in the wrong place. Shame on you Charles de Gaulle. Shame on you France. Shame on you Air France.
We flew out on a 747 Jumbo. C and I were in row 25, in the window and middle seat. C likes the window seat. I am not sure why. You can hardly see very much in the dark and they make you shutter it for most of the time on long-haul flights. Except for take-off and landing of course.
Apparently, according to my mate Smithy the pilot, they dim the cabin lights and insist on having all windows open (well the little blind thing up – I haven’t actually been on a plane with windows that open) so that your eyes are adjusted to the ambient light. So that you can see better in the event of something happening. Something like crashing, catching fire, or being hit by a terrorist’s shoulder held surface-to-air missile. To be quite frank, that is the kind of thing I would rather not see coming!
As readers of my previous blogs will know (see the Planes, Trains and Automobile entries), I prefer an aisle seat. My motives for this are, well, many and varied but on long-haul the main ones would be a) you can get out of your seat whenever you want to for toilet or booze without disturbing those weird folk that tend to be placed in the seat next to you, and b) the extra leg room. You cannot imagine the relief of brief opportunities to stretch a leg down the aisle in between trolleys.
But, on this occasion, C got her window seat and I got stuck in the middle. A petite Vietnamese lady sat in the aisle. She was about five foot nothing and her legs dangled off the end of the seat without reaching the floor. So, the aisle seat with its leg stretching opportunities was clearly wasted on her! My legs, however, were parted either side of magazine pocket and my knees wedged firmly against the back of the seat in front of me. Now at six feet and an important half inch tall I am hardly a midget, but nor am I a giant. This leg room was frankly pitiful.
I was wedged in and there I stayed for the better, no, the worse part of eleven hours. The twee Vietnamese lady to my left popped a couple of sleeping pills during the safety demonstration, which for some strange reason does not include any reference to the fact that being completely comatose in the event of an “ on-board incident” can clearly damage your health and the health of the poor sod wedged into the seat next to you. Me. She was out of it. In the event that this plane went down, C and I were going down with her!
Those little bottles of water that they give you on long-haul flights aren’t to prevent dehydration you know. No, they are designed to be emptied and then used as a personal relieving vessel (piss pot) by people wedged in the middle seat and who cannot get out to go to the loo.
It is impossible to sleep well when your knees are stuck firmly against the seat in front of you. It is impossible to sleep when the dainty Asian lady next to you keeps wriggling in her sleep and banging her arse against your armrest. Sleep would not come, despite the best endeavours of the Air France trolley dollies who plied me with alcohol and tried to induce slumber via the in-flight “entertainment”. I use the word incorrectly. It was not entertaining. Normally, the movie “A Night at the Museum” followed by back-to-back National Geographic documentaries, in French, would be enough to bring a coma on. But not when you are wedged in the middle seat of an Air France 747. Not when you have lost all feeling from the knees down. Not when your knees are bleeding because they have chafed against the seat in front. Not when your next-door neighbour keeps rubbing her bum against your elbow. Not when your thoughts are filled with the prospect of deep vein thrombosis and the growing awareness that your bladder is full!
Please Air France. Can we have more leg room?
Thursday, 22 March 2007
A Bientot!
A Bientot!
The Middle Man is going on a very well-deserved holiday. I'll be away for a couple of weeks, so you have no excuse for not catching up on reading through all my posts to date.
For those of you who know me well (or, who think you do), you will know that I only really begin to unwind upon arrival. Safe and sound. In thirty degrees and luxurious splendour. The first "holiday beer".....
Getting the cat to the cattery (today's unpleasant task) and inter-continental air travel are not without stress, as my entries "Planes, Trains & Automobiles" and "My Family and Other Animals" and other various escapades of the furball baby, Maslow, show. So wish us "bon voyage".
And I don't care about my carbon imprint! This long-haul flight is for C and I, and, this is one holiday we deserve. However, this is my first experience of inter-continental economy class. Wish me luck. Perhaps those nice people at Air France will take pity and upgrade us. Fingers crossed.
In the meantime, happy blogging everyone. See you in a couple of weeks.
Monday, 22 January 2007
Planes, Trains and Automobiles Part 3
One-Armed Bandits
What is it with Rotterdam in the Netherlands and one-armed taxi drivers?
During one job with the Company I had to spend typically 3 days a week in Rotterdam. Which is a bit like spending a 3rd of your life in Stoke. Not that I have anything against Stoke in particular – it has a half decent multi-plex cinema with a popcorn design on the carpet (although I suspect that that is not deliberate but a consequence of poor cleaning and the bad manners of the local inhabitants of the Potteries) – but I wouldn’t choose to spend 3 days of my life there every week either!
And so I became a Diamond Cardholder in the local Rotterdam Hilton hotel loyalty programme. Which reminds me…….I noticed, when checking in last night, that female hotel receptionists bring out much the same reaction in me as air stewardesses. Which made me also think of a similar reaction when I was 16 or 17 and totally infatuated with the Avon lady who used to sell cosmetics to my mom at the door and flirt with me furiously. She looked great all smartly dressed and made up, and could turn this hormonal teenager into a blushing frenzy of sexual fantasy. (My dad liked her too). It is that whole uniform, make-up and sparkly smile thing. I must be spending too much time away from the missus and in the company of my own right arm! And speaking of right arms……
The Hilton is just a 10 to 15 minute walk away from the office. I always walk to the hotel when I leave the office but, because I am inherently lazy and free with the Company’s money, I always jump in a taxi outside of the hotel in the morning to go to the office. I justify this to myself that a) it gets me to work some 3 to 5 minutes earlier, b) I have luggage with me, c) I don’t want to get wet/catch cold/get sweaty while walking, and, d) I’m worth it. Actually given my lack of exercise (other than walking the length of Schiphol airport twice a week) it is probably a health and safety thing – the walk could kill me.
Invariably I get the same taxi driver. A 50 something, one-armed, ancient rocker. He looks like an escapee from a Status Quo tribute band (or Golden Earring for the Dutchies). He is not unlike Peter Stringfellow. He has long, grey flowing locks combed back so as to look wind-swept, and, to hide the bald spot on the back of his head. He listens to a Dutch radio channel that is trapped in a time warp somewhere around the beginning of the 1980s – all rock ballads and Scandinavian groups singing in bad English. And, more importantly, he has no right arm.
It actually took me quite a time to notice that he had no right arm. Well, I am not at my best first thing in the morning, especially after a typically sleepless night in a hotel. The things I have heard through hotel walls! And, oh for a hotel with a decent air conditioning system – one which actually controls the temperature without spitting, gurgling, banging, humming, and rattling all night long. Thinking about it, maybe I can just hear next door’s air conditioning through the hotel walls! No I didn’t notice his lack of limb at first because he has a poor man’s prosthetic. I say poor man’s because this is clearly nothing prescribed by the Dutch health system, which I am led to believe is quite generous with such things. This is more the kind of thing that you would expect to see on a bonfire night’s Guy. It looks as if he has stuffed his shirtsleeve with straw and attached a rubber dolls hand at the end. At first I thought he was just a bad driver – he tends to take the corners quite wide – and too surly to be bothered to help with my luggage, but then I noticed (well I work in security and am quite observant with such things) that he only ever had his left hand on the steering wheel, and, there was always a look of slight panic if his mobile phone rang while he was not on a straight bit of road.
Never mind, he has not killed me yet. Or anyone else to my knowledge.
Actually I am generally quite pleased to see him in the morning as he is one of the few drivers that accepts my request for a lift to 22 Blaak with good grace. You see, these guys often have to wait outside of the hotel for quite some time (the central railway station being within easy walking distance, even with luggage) and are rather hopeful of bigger fares, such as to the airport or to the Hague, Amsterdam, etc. My quick trip round the block is hardly worth their while. However, Mr One-Armed Rocker knows that I tip generously with the Company’s money and will get my own bags out of the boot……
Imagine my surprise, however, when I left the hotel one morning and found Mr One-Armed Rocker stood waiting with two other taxi drivers and they had just 3 arms between them? I am glad to say, however, that they did have one upper limb each (but not necessarily the same one). I think that being driven around by a guy steering with his teeth, or, Heaven forbid, his bare feet, would be too much for me in the morning.
Rotterdam must have a club for them – One-Armed Drivers R Us. Or the local council must offer special incentives to attract people with specific disabilities. Well, at least it explains why Rotterdam has traffic lights on every junction (which is bloody frustrating!) – it is to slow these guys down sufficiently so that they can never get up to killing speed when taking the next bend a little too widely!
What is it with Rotterdam in the Netherlands and one-armed taxi drivers?
During one job with the Company I had to spend typically 3 days a week in Rotterdam. Which is a bit like spending a 3rd of your life in Stoke. Not that I have anything against Stoke in particular – it has a half decent multi-plex cinema with a popcorn design on the carpet (although I suspect that that is not deliberate but a consequence of poor cleaning and the bad manners of the local inhabitants of the Potteries) – but I wouldn’t choose to spend 3 days of my life there every week either!
And so I became a Diamond Cardholder in the local Rotterdam Hilton hotel loyalty programme. Which reminds me…….I noticed, when checking in last night, that female hotel receptionists bring out much the same reaction in me as air stewardesses. Which made me also think of a similar reaction when I was 16 or 17 and totally infatuated with the Avon lady who used to sell cosmetics to my mom at the door and flirt with me furiously. She looked great all smartly dressed and made up, and could turn this hormonal teenager into a blushing frenzy of sexual fantasy. (My dad liked her too). It is that whole uniform, make-up and sparkly smile thing. I must be spending too much time away from the missus and in the company of my own right arm! And speaking of right arms……
The Hilton is just a 10 to 15 minute walk away from the office. I always walk to the hotel when I leave the office but, because I am inherently lazy and free with the Company’s money, I always jump in a taxi outside of the hotel in the morning to go to the office. I justify this to myself that a) it gets me to work some 3 to 5 minutes earlier, b) I have luggage with me, c) I don’t want to get wet/catch cold/get sweaty while walking, and, d) I’m worth it. Actually given my lack of exercise (other than walking the length of Schiphol airport twice a week) it is probably a health and safety thing – the walk could kill me.
Invariably I get the same taxi driver. A 50 something, one-armed, ancient rocker. He looks like an escapee from a Status Quo tribute band (or Golden Earring for the Dutchies). He is not unlike Peter Stringfellow. He has long, grey flowing locks combed back so as to look wind-swept, and, to hide the bald spot on the back of his head. He listens to a Dutch radio channel that is trapped in a time warp somewhere around the beginning of the 1980s – all rock ballads and Scandinavian groups singing in bad English. And, more importantly, he has no right arm.
It actually took me quite a time to notice that he had no right arm. Well, I am not at my best first thing in the morning, especially after a typically sleepless night in a hotel. The things I have heard through hotel walls! And, oh for a hotel with a decent air conditioning system – one which actually controls the temperature without spitting, gurgling, banging, humming, and rattling all night long. Thinking about it, maybe I can just hear next door’s air conditioning through the hotel walls! No I didn’t notice his lack of limb at first because he has a poor man’s prosthetic. I say poor man’s because this is clearly nothing prescribed by the Dutch health system, which I am led to believe is quite generous with such things. This is more the kind of thing that you would expect to see on a bonfire night’s Guy. It looks as if he has stuffed his shirtsleeve with straw and attached a rubber dolls hand at the end. At first I thought he was just a bad driver – he tends to take the corners quite wide – and too surly to be bothered to help with my luggage, but then I noticed (well I work in security and am quite observant with such things) that he only ever had his left hand on the steering wheel, and, there was always a look of slight panic if his mobile phone rang while he was not on a straight bit of road.
Never mind, he has not killed me yet. Or anyone else to my knowledge.
Actually I am generally quite pleased to see him in the morning as he is one of the few drivers that accepts my request for a lift to 22 Blaak with good grace. You see, these guys often have to wait outside of the hotel for quite some time (the central railway station being within easy walking distance, even with luggage) and are rather hopeful of bigger fares, such as to the airport or to the Hague, Amsterdam, etc. My quick trip round the block is hardly worth their while. However, Mr One-Armed Rocker knows that I tip generously with the Company’s money and will get my own bags out of the boot……
Imagine my surprise, however, when I left the hotel one morning and found Mr One-Armed Rocker stood waiting with two other taxi drivers and they had just 3 arms between them? I am glad to say, however, that they did have one upper limb each (but not necessarily the same one). I think that being driven around by a guy steering with his teeth, or, Heaven forbid, his bare feet, would be too much for me in the morning.
Rotterdam must have a club for them – One-Armed Drivers R Us. Or the local council must offer special incentives to attract people with specific disabilities. Well, at least it explains why Rotterdam has traffic lights on every junction (which is bloody frustrating!) – it is to slow these guys down sufficiently so that they can never get up to killing speed when taking the next bend a little too widely!
Planes, Trains and Automobiles Part 2
Belgium is the Ireland of the Netherlands and France. That is to say that people in those countries make Belgian jokes in the same way as un-pc Brits (and I mean the “British” in the correct sense; i.e. non-Irish members of the United Kingdom) do about the Irish.
Well, I do not know if there is too much that can be read into this fact but my experience of travelling to and from Belgian has been “interesting”. Let me quote the examples of two different flights between the Netherlands and Brussels. Bear in mind that this is only a half-an-hour flight.
The first example was on a full flight from Brussels to the Netherlands. Everything had gone to plan. The plane was on time. The passengers had boarded. The multi-lingual safety announcement had been given in French, in Dutch and in English (must really pi*s you off if you are a native Spanish or Mandarin speaker!). And so, we began to taxi to the runway as normal.
Just as we began to pick up speed the guy sat in the aisle two rows in front of me must have suddenly realised that he had left his book or other reading material in his bag in the overhead locker above him. It must have been a compelling read for this gentleman decided to unbuckle his seat belt and stand up to retrieve his book.
As he stood the stewardess (or is that “cabin person”? I get very confused in these PC days. I know that that are no longer “Trolley Dollies” or “Air Hostesses” but exactly what we are supposed/allowed to call them I do not know) at the front of the plane picked up the microphone and stated politely “Sir. Please take your seat as we are about to take off.”
The man acknowledged he had heard by raising his hand but continued to rummage in his luggage. “Sir. Please sit down as we are about to take off.” The plane accelerated. The man rummaged. “Sit down now!” The plane accelerated. The plane lifted off. The plane tilted at a 45-degree angle. The man gently and, as if in slow motion, fell backwards and, as if in a cartoon, rolled the full length of the aisle until he hit the back of the plane. There was a dull thud. He stayed at the back of the plane until it levelled off and the cabin crew (“stewards” and “stewardesses”?) were able to come to his aid.
Thankfully he was OK and with nothing more than his ego bruised and paperback ruffled he retook his seat and began to read his book. There was, however, an almost audible and synchronised collective thought amongst all of the Dutch passengers: “Belgians!”
My second Belgian flight story was a little more colourful. Again I was travelling from Brussels to Amsterdam. (NB. I have since discovered the simple pleasure of the international train between these two great capital cities. Thankfully).
As ever, I was one of the first to board the plane. These days luggage space on board planes is rather tight and if you leave it too late to board then you run the risk of not having a space for your PC bag and the other piece of luggage which contains your toothbrush, razor (even beardies have to shave!), duty free (not any more unfortunately – you can stick your European Union if abolition of duty free is seen to be progress!) and your dirty smalls. If you can’t squeeze it under the seat in front of you, you run the risk that some surly member of the cabin crew will snatch it from your grasp in return for the mandatory docket and banish said baggage to the hold, with the prospect of a further loss of 45 minutes of your life as you stand next to a whining, beeping, revolving luggage carousel waiting to be reunited with said bags.
Unusually I was sat in a window seat. I usually prefer to sit in an aisle. Aisle seats have a number of advantages over other seats: 1) You are able to recover your luggage (if it has not been snatched and banished) more easily and vacate the plane more rapidly upon arrival, 2) in the event of an emergency you trample fewer fellow passengers in your blind panic of a rush to the emergency exits, 3) you can stretch your legs occasionally between trolleys and so avoid the risk of deep vein thrombosis, and 4) in the event of a pretty one, you can ogle the stewardess.
I think that most travelling men will have to admit that there is still something very sexy about a girl in uniform. This sexiness is multiplied several times by the added coincidence of 1) makeup, 2) the fact that this is an old-fashioned girl that still serves her man, and 3) rumours of stockings and suspenders, the Mile High Club and good time parties back at the crew’s stopover hotel! There is not a red-blooded male that has not travelled by air and, when blessed with a pretty one (which is increasingly rare, especially on BA domestic flights. This is because the profession is being taken over by Julian Clarey wannabes) and not hoped that the stewardess would actually simulate blowing into the top up pipe of the lifejacket during the safety demonstration. There is something very stimulating about pursed rouged lips around a pipe……
Similarly, we all know that it is a bloke that chooses the uniforms for all of the airlines. Blouses rather too tight and gaping around the nipple area. Skirts rather too short and rather too tight around the bum. High heels. In any case, the aisle is the best seat from which to watch the stewardess cross and uncross her legs during take-off and landing when she is sat at the jump seat at the front!
And so, I was a little pissed off to find myself in the window seat and soon found myself looking out of the window. Well, what else is there to do? I noticed that the plane seemed to be surrounded by armed members of the Belgian police. Hmmn, unusual…..
Eventually the plane began to fill up until there remained just two empty seats – the two next to me. Then, I espied another policeman. This one was on board. This one was making his way down the aisle towards me. This policeman was towing two reluctant passenger handcuffed together behind him. He un-cuffed his prisoners, ensured they sat down in the seats next to me, and he left.
I felt a tad uncomfortable in my window seat. The two prisoners looked like they had just escaped from a Hollywood film set. The film would have been called something like “Serial Gangster and his Bitch: Escape to Belgium”.
We did not introduce ourselves or exchange pleasantries. The bloke, who had the aisle seat looked like your typical South American drug dealer. He was tall with long dark hair tied back in a ponytail. He sported a goatee and a silver tooth. A medallion. He wore a black sleeveless shirt that showed off his not-inconsiderable muscles and his prison tattoos, and, leather pants.
His slim, gum-chewing, buxom girlfriend was dressed like a hooker, similarly dark-haired, "blinged" and tattooed. Her cleavage was impressively squeezed into a boob tube that was cut off to show her pierced midriff and six-pack. She had an impossibly tiny denim skirt which revealed a lot of thigh above high-heeled, knee length shiny black boots. I was sure that she must have her own website……and that it would be a popular one!
These pair were clearly “no-do-gooders” being extradited from Belgium to the Netherlands. Both were clearly stoned. The woman in particular was out of it and proceeded to rest her head on my shoulder and fall asleep. She dribbled. A growing damp patch soon began to fill my shirt sleeve. I did not complain. I did not move. I tried not to look at her bosom or thighs for fear that her man might be watching. So, I fixed my gaze out of the window until we landed in Amsterdam.
All the other passengers left the plane before the armed Dutch police officer came on board, re-cuffed his guests and rescued me.
This was the one and only time I have been the last to get off a plane. I prefer the aisle seat. I travel by train between Brussels and the Netherlands now!
Well, I do not know if there is too much that can be read into this fact but my experience of travelling to and from Belgian has been “interesting”. Let me quote the examples of two different flights between the Netherlands and Brussels. Bear in mind that this is only a half-an-hour flight.
The first example was on a full flight from Brussels to the Netherlands. Everything had gone to plan. The plane was on time. The passengers had boarded. The multi-lingual safety announcement had been given in French, in Dutch and in English (must really pi*s you off if you are a native Spanish or Mandarin speaker!). And so, we began to taxi to the runway as normal.
Just as we began to pick up speed the guy sat in the aisle two rows in front of me must have suddenly realised that he had left his book or other reading material in his bag in the overhead locker above him. It must have been a compelling read for this gentleman decided to unbuckle his seat belt and stand up to retrieve his book.
As he stood the stewardess (or is that “cabin person”? I get very confused in these PC days. I know that that are no longer “Trolley Dollies” or “Air Hostesses” but exactly what we are supposed/allowed to call them I do not know) at the front of the plane picked up the microphone and stated politely “Sir. Please take your seat as we are about to take off.”
The man acknowledged he had heard by raising his hand but continued to rummage in his luggage. “Sir. Please sit down as we are about to take off.” The plane accelerated. The man rummaged. “Sit down now!” The plane accelerated. The plane lifted off. The plane tilted at a 45-degree angle. The man gently and, as if in slow motion, fell backwards and, as if in a cartoon, rolled the full length of the aisle until he hit the back of the plane. There was a dull thud. He stayed at the back of the plane until it levelled off and the cabin crew (“stewards” and “stewardesses”?) were able to come to his aid.
Thankfully he was OK and with nothing more than his ego bruised and paperback ruffled he retook his seat and began to read his book. There was, however, an almost audible and synchronised collective thought amongst all of the Dutch passengers: “Belgians!”
My second Belgian flight story was a little more colourful. Again I was travelling from Brussels to Amsterdam. (NB. I have since discovered the simple pleasure of the international train between these two great capital cities. Thankfully).
As ever, I was one of the first to board the plane. These days luggage space on board planes is rather tight and if you leave it too late to board then you run the risk of not having a space for your PC bag and the other piece of luggage which contains your toothbrush, razor (even beardies have to shave!), duty free (not any more unfortunately – you can stick your European Union if abolition of duty free is seen to be progress!) and your dirty smalls. If you can’t squeeze it under the seat in front of you, you run the risk that some surly member of the cabin crew will snatch it from your grasp in return for the mandatory docket and banish said baggage to the hold, with the prospect of a further loss of 45 minutes of your life as you stand next to a whining, beeping, revolving luggage carousel waiting to be reunited with said bags.
Unusually I was sat in a window seat. I usually prefer to sit in an aisle. Aisle seats have a number of advantages over other seats: 1) You are able to recover your luggage (if it has not been snatched and banished) more easily and vacate the plane more rapidly upon arrival, 2) in the event of an emergency you trample fewer fellow passengers in your blind panic of a rush to the emergency exits, 3) you can stretch your legs occasionally between trolleys and so avoid the risk of deep vein thrombosis, and 4) in the event of a pretty one, you can ogle the stewardess.
I think that most travelling men will have to admit that there is still something very sexy about a girl in uniform. This sexiness is multiplied several times by the added coincidence of 1) makeup, 2) the fact that this is an old-fashioned girl that still serves her man, and 3) rumours of stockings and suspenders, the Mile High Club and good time parties back at the crew’s stopover hotel! There is not a red-blooded male that has not travelled by air and, when blessed with a pretty one (which is increasingly rare, especially on BA domestic flights. This is because the profession is being taken over by Julian Clarey wannabes) and not hoped that the stewardess would actually simulate blowing into the top up pipe of the lifejacket during the safety demonstration. There is something very stimulating about pursed rouged lips around a pipe……
Similarly, we all know that it is a bloke that chooses the uniforms for all of the airlines. Blouses rather too tight and gaping around the nipple area. Skirts rather too short and rather too tight around the bum. High heels. In any case, the aisle is the best seat from which to watch the stewardess cross and uncross her legs during take-off and landing when she is sat at the jump seat at the front!
And so, I was a little pissed off to find myself in the window seat and soon found myself looking out of the window. Well, what else is there to do? I noticed that the plane seemed to be surrounded by armed members of the Belgian police. Hmmn, unusual…..
Eventually the plane began to fill up until there remained just two empty seats – the two next to me. Then, I espied another policeman. This one was on board. This one was making his way down the aisle towards me. This policeman was towing two reluctant passenger handcuffed together behind him. He un-cuffed his prisoners, ensured they sat down in the seats next to me, and he left.
I felt a tad uncomfortable in my window seat. The two prisoners looked like they had just escaped from a Hollywood film set. The film would have been called something like “Serial Gangster and his Bitch: Escape to Belgium”.
We did not introduce ourselves or exchange pleasantries. The bloke, who had the aisle seat looked like your typical South American drug dealer. He was tall with long dark hair tied back in a ponytail. He sported a goatee and a silver tooth. A medallion. He wore a black sleeveless shirt that showed off his not-inconsiderable muscles and his prison tattoos, and, leather pants.
His slim, gum-chewing, buxom girlfriend was dressed like a hooker, similarly dark-haired, "blinged" and tattooed. Her cleavage was impressively squeezed into a boob tube that was cut off to show her pierced midriff and six-pack. She had an impossibly tiny denim skirt which revealed a lot of thigh above high-heeled, knee length shiny black boots. I was sure that she must have her own website……and that it would be a popular one!
These pair were clearly “no-do-gooders” being extradited from Belgium to the Netherlands. Both were clearly stoned. The woman in particular was out of it and proceeded to rest her head on my shoulder and fall asleep. She dribbled. A growing damp patch soon began to fill my shirt sleeve. I did not complain. I did not move. I tried not to look at her bosom or thighs for fear that her man might be watching. So, I fixed my gaze out of the window until we landed in Amsterdam.
All the other passengers left the plane before the armed Dutch police officer came on board, re-cuffed his guests and rescued me.
This was the one and only time I have been the last to get off a plane. I prefer the aisle seat. I travel by train between Brussels and the Netherlands now!
Planes, Trains and Automobiles Part 1
Corporate Travel
Business travel is not all it is cracked up to be............as my (2nd) trip to Argentina may demonstrate.
I arrived at Buenos Aires in the middle of a horrendous electrical storm. It was 8am local time and as black as night. Thunder and lightning were exploding all around us and I have never experienced turbulence like it in a big plane like that (an Air France Airbus). After 3 aborted landing attempts we were made to circle for an hour until the storm moved away from the airport, and, presumably, to waste a little fuel in case of a failed landing attempt. Which is known as crashing in non-aviator circles!. It was quite a relief to get down in the end.
The journey by taxi into the city from the airport was also quite interesting - much of the motorway and main roads on the journey were flooded and in some places quite badly.......I got my feet wet as the water was above the level of the taxi’s wheels in certain parts. At least it was warm rain…………………
Then it was work, work, work. Early starts, long days and late finishes. In fact I did not step outside of the hotel until 21.00 on the Wednesday evening - for a dinner at a nearby restaurant - and I left on Thursday.
The 13 hour trip from Buenos Aires to Paris dragged quite a bit. This was mainly due to the fact that there was an Argentinean woman sitting two rows behind me who was travelling with two kids. One, a babe in arms, would wake up every two hours and scream the place down. The other, a toddler around two years old, would run away from his mom and chase around the business class lounge, climbing all over peoples' seats. Including my seat. Which I was sat in. It was like sitting in a busy cinema while the people behind you performed Riverdance on the back of your chair. I was forced to watch Lord of the Rings dubbed in French (it is not quite the same – it makes Aragorn seem a little effeminate) on the in-flight movie channel, otherwise I would have gone completely mad and killed the little ba*tard.
So, I was feeling quite relieved, if not refreshed, when we arrived at Paris Roissy (the French deliberately like to confuse the international traveller by having 2 names for Charles de Gaulle airport) an hour ahead of schedule on the Friday morning, at 10am. My flight to Manchester was at 13.30 so I settled into the business lounge, had yet another glass of champagne to celebrate Birmingham City's triumphant rise to the Premiership, and went to the gate at 12.45 as requested to do so by the flashing green banner on the display monitors. At the gate, there was a new message: “Delayed! Delayed! Delayed!” But no other bloody information to tell you why or for how long. And no bloody staff to help either.
So, I returned to the Business Lounge of Air France where there was a growing crowd of increasingly irate Brits. Apparently, the brand-new Air Traffic control systems recently installed in the UK (by EDS of course!) had completely failed and all flights to and from the UK were cancelled until the next morning, earliest. All hotels at the airport were already full. Aaargghh! The prospect of spending the night with a bottle of champagne and SKY Business News in the business lounge was not an attractive one. The homing instant is strong in this one and so I determined to find an alternative route home.
To make things worse, they could not find my baggage either. Of course, it had been checked straight through from Argentina to Manchester. So, I was forced to abandon it at the airport. I grabbed a taxi and crawled (it was the start of a bank holiday weekend in France) across the city to the Gare Du Nord and joined the long ticket queue for the Eurostar to London. Because of redevelopment in the station, there was no lounge at the Gare Du Nord, so I was forced to lean against a wall for an hour or so before boarding the train. I must have begun to smell pretty badly by now, so at least my personal space was preserved.
The train was absolutely packed ......and late. They had been flooded with stranded would-be plane travellers desperate to get back to the UK. It took 45 minutes to get everyone on board instead of the usual 15 minutes.
This journey was also “interesting” due to the fact that I found myself sat across from an obsessive compulisve with a drinking problem. He was probably thinking the same about me. Whenever a member of staff passed by he insisted on getting another drink of champagne. He would then go through this very, very strange ritual as part of the drinking process. This involved ensuring that the glass was dead in the centre of the table; turning it anti-clockwise 12 times; drinking it two-handed in 7 swallows; cleaning the inside of the glass with his tongue; and, then turning the glass upside down and peering into it for 5 minutes, turning it around 4 times, clockwise, to make sure that it was empty. I joke not. He was either obsessive compulsive or the couple of aspirin I had taken earlier to prevent the onset of deep vein thrombosis on the flight from Argentina were beginning to mix with my champagne and fatigue with some very strange side effects.
And so I arrived in Waterloo in London.....took a tube to Euston........stood around for a while before getting a train to Crewe.....where I arrived, on time, at 22.30 and so home...............to bed. Total travelling time 27 hours 30 minutes. My baggage travelled for an additional 36 hours, finally arriving Sunday evening!
Possibly my worst trip, however, was to the Isle of Bute in Scotland. We had arranged to spend a long weekend there, at a Landmark Trust property, with friends from London. They were flying up to Glasgow on the Friday and picking up a hire car for the short journey by road and ferry to Bute. We, however, were planning to drive up on the Friday from our home in Cheshire – an 8 hour drive. And, as we had arranged the trip we were keen to be first at the property to check it out and make it warm and welcoming for our friends. This meant that we would have to be on the road by something like 8am.
I was a little miffed (to say the least), therefore, when my boss “summoned” me to a 2 hour meeting in Rotterdam on the Thursday afternoon. This was in the days when direct flights between Manchester and Rotterdam had ceased so the journey consisted of a flight to Amsterdam and a 45 minute train journey to Rotterdam, and the same in reverse. If my meeting finished on time I was to fly out of Schiphol around 7pm and be home for 8pm UK time Thursday night.
It was not to be. I remember complaining to my driver on the way to the airport – one of my privileges of rank is that I get an executive car service between home and the airport – moaning about my summons and the fact that I would have a long drive ahead of me on the Friday morning.
My flight out was, unusually, on time. My connection with the train (they run every 30 minutes) was also on time, as was the train itself. They are very efficient these Dutchies. (Mussolini would have been proud of them). And so, I arrived in the office around 11.30 local time. I then kicked my heels for a couple of hours and tried to look busy until my meeting at 2pm.
At 2pm I went into the meeting room and greeted my colleagues. “Not flying out tonight are you?” asked one of my teammates. “Yes”, I replied. “I have a day off tomorrow and am going to Scotland.” “Not flying from Schiphol I hope?” he replied. “Yes. Why?”. “Because there has been a fire at Schiphol and the airport is closed.”
At this point I left the meeting. I left the meeting that I had not wanted to attend before it had begun. I told my boss that I had to sort my travel arrangements as I had to be back home this evening otherwise all plans for the weekend would have been ruined and my wife would be, well, less than happy.
I phoned our travel department and asked them if they could transfer me to flights leaving from Rotterdam with a connection in City Airport, London. “All flights from Rotterdam are booked, Sir. There has been a fire at Schiphol!”. I explained that I knew about the fire and that I really needed to get home that evening. I enquired how likely it was that the airport would be open by the time my flight was due to leave. “It is unlikely, Sir. It was a very serious fire.” Apparently the Burger King in the main concourse had set alight. If you have ever experienced Dutch cuisine you would understand what a terrible calamity this indeed was. So, I enquired of my other travel options…..
My way home that day involved getting from the office to Rotterdam Central train station. I accomplished this by tram with no difficulty. I then had to get the international train from Rotterdam to Brussels, being the capital of Belgium, being the neighbouring bloody country. I accomplished this with no difficulty.
At Brussels airport the nice people at British Airways took pity on me and upgraded me to business class. This meant I had access to the business lounge, free alcohol, a British newspaper, and, free snacks – sandwiches, olives, peanuts, cherry tomatoes, processed cheese, popcorn and the like. This was great as I had been booked on the 8pm flight from Brussels (which meant I should be home at 9pm UK time – just one hour later than planned) to Manchester and I had 3 hours to kill.
I used part of this time to leave voicemail messages for Cathy, my wife, who was out at work. The messages were along the lines of “You’ll never guess what has happened but don’t worry I’ll be back tonight”. I read a paper, did the crossword (this was in the days before Soduko), sipped my drinks, nibbled my nuts (!) and sent a few emails before sauntering to the gate at the prescribed time.
At the gate I found my fellow would-be passengers………and no staff. This is never a good sign. Nor did I see good signs on looking out of the window (the BA Lounge at Brussels airport has no windows). It was foggy. It was very foggy. It was so foggy that you could not see further than the windows themselves. We waited a while. As we waited the departure board began to flash “cancelled” alongside various flights with all too alarming a frequency. Eventually, a member of BA staff came to the gate and explained that the fog was set to stay and that it was likely that the airport would close. Our flight, however, had not yet been cancelled so we were not in a position to transfer to other flights with spaces that were expected to leave, nor did we qualify for free overnight stays in an airport hotel, nor could they guarantee a first flight out in the morning. Sh*t!. I felt my weekend and my marriage disappearing……
I didn’t care about money – the Company would pay. I just had to get home. So, I went to try and book an alternative flight. There were none. There were no flights going anywhere. The airport was closed. The first available flight out in the morning was not before 09.30 which meant that I would not be in time to make it to drive to Bute so my only alternative would be for Cathy to drive herself, and for me to fly to Glasgow. Cathy would not be happy. I was not bloody happy. Especially as all the airport hotels were already full! Passengers were beginning to jostle for space on benches……..
And then a glimmer of hope…….apparently our incoming flight was still circling. Apparently, our flight had a Manchester-based crew on board and they too were keen to get home tonight. They were circling in the hope that the weather would improve to enable them to land and whisk us back home to hearth and loved ones.
By 11pm the weather had not improved, the airport was closed and our plane had been diverted to Ostende. Fortunately, our plane was full of businessmen desperate to get home and sporting BA Gold Cards. I, being a KLM frequenter merely had a BA Blue Card which was next to useless. These Gold Card types were complaining vociferously and threatening all kinds of things as only pompous, self-important British businessmen can. Eventually, it was decided to send us to Ostende. Within the hour a couple of coaches were found and we began the hour or so journey by road to Ostende. I spent most of the journey making calming calls to Cathy and checking out alternatives such as the Ostende ferry….just in case.
We cleared the fog. We arrived at the airport. We could see the plane on the tarmac. We left the coaches. The coaches left. We entered the airport. The airport was empty. There was not a soul to be found. The Gold Card Customer Service desk again suffered verbal abuse until they actually made radio contact with the Captain of the plane. The Captain of the plane managed to locate some airport staff and we eventually found ourselves on board. Eventually they found someone to de-ice the plane’s wings and we were able to take off. I spent most of the journey worrying whether taxis still operated from Manchester airport at that time in the morning or would I be stranded or, worse, have to call the wife out…..as I was sure that my exec car would have been cancelled.
We landed at Manchester at 2.30 am. The airport should have been closed at this time so I hate to think what fines BA had incurred to bring us home. As I walked through the gates into arrivals I was more than a little thrilled to see Ian, my exec car driver standing there, waiting for me. I was not so thrilled to see he was chuckling, none too quietly, to himself. I mentioned nightmare journeys, airport fires, wiping grins off faces and other such expletives. He apologised and explained. What I didn’t know was that within an hour of my call to the travel department, Schiphol airport in Amsterdam had reopened. Yes, there was a backlog of flights but my original flight home only suffered an hour delay. If I had just ignored the travel department’s advice and proceeded as planned, I would have landed five and a half hours earlier !! Ian had known of my weekend away and taken pity on me. He took me home.
And so, just one tram, one train, one coach, one plane, one car and three different countries later I crawled into my bed. Just six hours later we hit the road. We got to Bute on time. Our friends were late and grumbling about the one hour delay they had suffered on route - Easyjet. Travel virgins!. We had a great time! Thanks Ian.
Business travel is not all it is cracked up to be............as my (2nd) trip to Argentina may demonstrate.
I arrived at Buenos Aires in the middle of a horrendous electrical storm. It was 8am local time and as black as night. Thunder and lightning were exploding all around us and I have never experienced turbulence like it in a big plane like that (an Air France Airbus). After 3 aborted landing attempts we were made to circle for an hour until the storm moved away from the airport, and, presumably, to waste a little fuel in case of a failed landing attempt. Which is known as crashing in non-aviator circles!. It was quite a relief to get down in the end.
The journey by taxi into the city from the airport was also quite interesting - much of the motorway and main roads on the journey were flooded and in some places quite badly.......I got my feet wet as the water was above the level of the taxi’s wheels in certain parts. At least it was warm rain…………………
Then it was work, work, work. Early starts, long days and late finishes. In fact I did not step outside of the hotel until 21.00 on the Wednesday evening - for a dinner at a nearby restaurant - and I left on Thursday.
The 13 hour trip from Buenos Aires to Paris dragged quite a bit. This was mainly due to the fact that there was an Argentinean woman sitting two rows behind me who was travelling with two kids. One, a babe in arms, would wake up every two hours and scream the place down. The other, a toddler around two years old, would run away from his mom and chase around the business class lounge, climbing all over peoples' seats. Including my seat. Which I was sat in. It was like sitting in a busy cinema while the people behind you performed Riverdance on the back of your chair. I was forced to watch Lord of the Rings dubbed in French (it is not quite the same – it makes Aragorn seem a little effeminate) on the in-flight movie channel, otherwise I would have gone completely mad and killed the little ba*tard.
So, I was feeling quite relieved, if not refreshed, when we arrived at Paris Roissy (the French deliberately like to confuse the international traveller by having 2 names for Charles de Gaulle airport) an hour ahead of schedule on the Friday morning, at 10am. My flight to Manchester was at 13.30 so I settled into the business lounge, had yet another glass of champagne to celebrate Birmingham City's triumphant rise to the Premiership, and went to the gate at 12.45 as requested to do so by the flashing green banner on the display monitors. At the gate, there was a new message: “Delayed! Delayed! Delayed!” But no other bloody information to tell you why or for how long. And no bloody staff to help either.
So, I returned to the Business Lounge of Air France where there was a growing crowd of increasingly irate Brits. Apparently, the brand-new Air Traffic control systems recently installed in the UK (by EDS of course!) had completely failed and all flights to and from the UK were cancelled until the next morning, earliest. All hotels at the airport were already full. Aaargghh! The prospect of spending the night with a bottle of champagne and SKY Business News in the business lounge was not an attractive one. The homing instant is strong in this one and so I determined to find an alternative route home.
To make things worse, they could not find my baggage either. Of course, it had been checked straight through from Argentina to Manchester. So, I was forced to abandon it at the airport. I grabbed a taxi and crawled (it was the start of a bank holiday weekend in France) across the city to the Gare Du Nord and joined the long ticket queue for the Eurostar to London. Because of redevelopment in the station, there was no lounge at the Gare Du Nord, so I was forced to lean against a wall for an hour or so before boarding the train. I must have begun to smell pretty badly by now, so at least my personal space was preserved.
The train was absolutely packed ......and late. They had been flooded with stranded would-be plane travellers desperate to get back to the UK. It took 45 minutes to get everyone on board instead of the usual 15 minutes.
This journey was also “interesting” due to the fact that I found myself sat across from an obsessive compulisve with a drinking problem. He was probably thinking the same about me. Whenever a member of staff passed by he insisted on getting another drink of champagne. He would then go through this very, very strange ritual as part of the drinking process. This involved ensuring that the glass was dead in the centre of the table; turning it anti-clockwise 12 times; drinking it two-handed in 7 swallows; cleaning the inside of the glass with his tongue; and, then turning the glass upside down and peering into it for 5 minutes, turning it around 4 times, clockwise, to make sure that it was empty. I joke not. He was either obsessive compulsive or the couple of aspirin I had taken earlier to prevent the onset of deep vein thrombosis on the flight from Argentina were beginning to mix with my champagne and fatigue with some very strange side effects.
And so I arrived in Waterloo in London.....took a tube to Euston........stood around for a while before getting a train to Crewe.....where I arrived, on time, at 22.30 and so home...............to bed. Total travelling time 27 hours 30 minutes. My baggage travelled for an additional 36 hours, finally arriving Sunday evening!
Possibly my worst trip, however, was to the Isle of Bute in Scotland. We had arranged to spend a long weekend there, at a Landmark Trust property, with friends from London. They were flying up to Glasgow on the Friday and picking up a hire car for the short journey by road and ferry to Bute. We, however, were planning to drive up on the Friday from our home in Cheshire – an 8 hour drive. And, as we had arranged the trip we were keen to be first at the property to check it out and make it warm and welcoming for our friends. This meant that we would have to be on the road by something like 8am.
I was a little miffed (to say the least), therefore, when my boss “summoned” me to a 2 hour meeting in Rotterdam on the Thursday afternoon. This was in the days when direct flights between Manchester and Rotterdam had ceased so the journey consisted of a flight to Amsterdam and a 45 minute train journey to Rotterdam, and the same in reverse. If my meeting finished on time I was to fly out of Schiphol around 7pm and be home for 8pm UK time Thursday night.
It was not to be. I remember complaining to my driver on the way to the airport – one of my privileges of rank is that I get an executive car service between home and the airport – moaning about my summons and the fact that I would have a long drive ahead of me on the Friday morning.
My flight out was, unusually, on time. My connection with the train (they run every 30 minutes) was also on time, as was the train itself. They are very efficient these Dutchies. (Mussolini would have been proud of them). And so, I arrived in the office around 11.30 local time. I then kicked my heels for a couple of hours and tried to look busy until my meeting at 2pm.
At 2pm I went into the meeting room and greeted my colleagues. “Not flying out tonight are you?” asked one of my teammates. “Yes”, I replied. “I have a day off tomorrow and am going to Scotland.” “Not flying from Schiphol I hope?” he replied. “Yes. Why?”. “Because there has been a fire at Schiphol and the airport is closed.”
At this point I left the meeting. I left the meeting that I had not wanted to attend before it had begun. I told my boss that I had to sort my travel arrangements as I had to be back home this evening otherwise all plans for the weekend would have been ruined and my wife would be, well, less than happy.
I phoned our travel department and asked them if they could transfer me to flights leaving from Rotterdam with a connection in City Airport, London. “All flights from Rotterdam are booked, Sir. There has been a fire at Schiphol!”. I explained that I knew about the fire and that I really needed to get home that evening. I enquired how likely it was that the airport would be open by the time my flight was due to leave. “It is unlikely, Sir. It was a very serious fire.” Apparently the Burger King in the main concourse had set alight. If you have ever experienced Dutch cuisine you would understand what a terrible calamity this indeed was. So, I enquired of my other travel options…..
My way home that day involved getting from the office to Rotterdam Central train station. I accomplished this by tram with no difficulty. I then had to get the international train from Rotterdam to Brussels, being the capital of Belgium, being the neighbouring bloody country. I accomplished this with no difficulty.
At Brussels airport the nice people at British Airways took pity on me and upgraded me to business class. This meant I had access to the business lounge, free alcohol, a British newspaper, and, free snacks – sandwiches, olives, peanuts, cherry tomatoes, processed cheese, popcorn and the like. This was great as I had been booked on the 8pm flight from Brussels (which meant I should be home at 9pm UK time – just one hour later than planned) to Manchester and I had 3 hours to kill.
I used part of this time to leave voicemail messages for Cathy, my wife, who was out at work. The messages were along the lines of “You’ll never guess what has happened but don’t worry I’ll be back tonight”. I read a paper, did the crossword (this was in the days before Soduko), sipped my drinks, nibbled my nuts (!) and sent a few emails before sauntering to the gate at the prescribed time.
At the gate I found my fellow would-be passengers………and no staff. This is never a good sign. Nor did I see good signs on looking out of the window (the BA Lounge at Brussels airport has no windows). It was foggy. It was very foggy. It was so foggy that you could not see further than the windows themselves. We waited a while. As we waited the departure board began to flash “cancelled” alongside various flights with all too alarming a frequency. Eventually, a member of BA staff came to the gate and explained that the fog was set to stay and that it was likely that the airport would close. Our flight, however, had not yet been cancelled so we were not in a position to transfer to other flights with spaces that were expected to leave, nor did we qualify for free overnight stays in an airport hotel, nor could they guarantee a first flight out in the morning. Sh*t!. I felt my weekend and my marriage disappearing……
I didn’t care about money – the Company would pay. I just had to get home. So, I went to try and book an alternative flight. There were none. There were no flights going anywhere. The airport was closed. The first available flight out in the morning was not before 09.30 which meant that I would not be in time to make it to drive to Bute so my only alternative would be for Cathy to drive herself, and for me to fly to Glasgow. Cathy would not be happy. I was not bloody happy. Especially as all the airport hotels were already full! Passengers were beginning to jostle for space on benches……..
And then a glimmer of hope…….apparently our incoming flight was still circling. Apparently, our flight had a Manchester-based crew on board and they too were keen to get home tonight. They were circling in the hope that the weather would improve to enable them to land and whisk us back home to hearth and loved ones.
By 11pm the weather had not improved, the airport was closed and our plane had been diverted to Ostende. Fortunately, our plane was full of businessmen desperate to get home and sporting BA Gold Cards. I, being a KLM frequenter merely had a BA Blue Card which was next to useless. These Gold Card types were complaining vociferously and threatening all kinds of things as only pompous, self-important British businessmen can. Eventually, it was decided to send us to Ostende. Within the hour a couple of coaches were found and we began the hour or so journey by road to Ostende. I spent most of the journey making calming calls to Cathy and checking out alternatives such as the Ostende ferry….just in case.
We cleared the fog. We arrived at the airport. We could see the plane on the tarmac. We left the coaches. The coaches left. We entered the airport. The airport was empty. There was not a soul to be found. The Gold Card Customer Service desk again suffered verbal abuse until they actually made radio contact with the Captain of the plane. The Captain of the plane managed to locate some airport staff and we eventually found ourselves on board. Eventually they found someone to de-ice the plane’s wings and we were able to take off. I spent most of the journey worrying whether taxis still operated from Manchester airport at that time in the morning or would I be stranded or, worse, have to call the wife out…..as I was sure that my exec car would have been cancelled.
We landed at Manchester at 2.30 am. The airport should have been closed at this time so I hate to think what fines BA had incurred to bring us home. As I walked through the gates into arrivals I was more than a little thrilled to see Ian, my exec car driver standing there, waiting for me. I was not so thrilled to see he was chuckling, none too quietly, to himself. I mentioned nightmare journeys, airport fires, wiping grins off faces and other such expletives. He apologised and explained. What I didn’t know was that within an hour of my call to the travel department, Schiphol airport in Amsterdam had reopened. Yes, there was a backlog of flights but my original flight home only suffered an hour delay. If I had just ignored the travel department’s advice and proceeded as planned, I would have landed five and a half hours earlier !! Ian had known of my weekend away and taken pity on me. He took me home.
And so, just one tram, one train, one coach, one plane, one car and three different countries later I crawled into my bed. Just six hours later we hit the road. We got to Bute on time. Our friends were late and grumbling about the one hour delay they had suffered on route - Easyjet. Travel virgins!. We had a great time! Thanks Ian.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
