Another airport..

When I received my passport and visa for Indonesia back from London (just in time too, they were delayed by the more or less complete shutdown of London in the snow on Monday & Tuesday), I was pleasantly surprised to see that my baggage allowance for the sectors from London to Denpasar was a generous 35kgs. Apparently I’m travelling on a missionary ticket - the airlines only issue these to registered charities and they have a more generous baggage allowance than regular economy tickets and less stringent cancellation and amendment policies. However, this surprise was dampened a little when I saw that my allowance for the Dublin – London sector of my journey was a miserly 20kgs ! However, after a couple of calls to BMI’s call centre on Friday afternoon, they kindly agreed to amend the allowance on my ticket to the higher limit for the first flight also. So, I’ve left my car behind, checked in, disposed of two large bags which I hope to see again in Bali tomorrow and am now looking out of the window in the departures area at a completely white apron and runway as a light dusting of snow falls. This is of some concern to me as Dublin Airport does not seem to have a great history of dealing well with the white stuff and, in fact, the airport was closed by snow for some hours last Thursday afternoon, resulting in over 170 flights being either diverted or cancelled. As I have just 90 minutes between flights in Heathrow and have to get from T1 to T3 in that time, I can’t afford any delays on this leg ! The airport is very busy (but rather subdued) with lots of despondent French rugby supporters who are still reeling from the shock of yesterday’s defeat in Croke Park. What a great start to the season - even Hooky seemed to enjoy it despite himself !

I’m going to post this shortly so (assuming that the snow doesn’t interfere) this will be my last post from recession struck Europe for quite a while. The next update should come from nice warm Denpasar sometime later this week. However, just as I was about to click “POST” there was an announcement about a cancelled flight due to “adverse weather”. Fingers crossed..

In the meantime, while I’m gone please all do your bit for the country, stop saving and get out there and start spending – there are plenty of empty seats in restaurants (at least the ones that are still open although I noted that Café Bar Deli in Bray closed its doors for the last time yesterday) and there are some good deals to be had ! It’s a great time to buy a second hand car too. Hopefully by the time I get back¸ between you, you’ll have sorted it all out and the place will be flying again......