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Tag: Airlines

  • Wizz Air (Faro to Warsaw Chopin)

    Wizz Air (Faro to Warsaw Chopin)

    After my little beach walk in the morning, it was time to return to Faro Airport just a few hours after arriving there. And, I will admit that the planning element of all of this was a little sub-optimal. I had flown from Norwich to Faro as the Ryanair flight was very cheap and I noticed I could then fly from Faro to Warsaw with the last minute flight availability from my Wizz Air Multipass. I like Warsaw, as I might have mentioned, so my plan was to spend some time there.

    That was until I saw the hotel prices, which have been becoming consistently high over recent months. Warsaw has clearly worked out that I like it and is now attempting to monetise the emotional relationship. I then noticed that there was a flight from Warsaw to Bilbao, which is where I planned to spend a few days. So the new arrangement became Faro to Warsaw, then Warsaw to Bilbao, which looked perfectly sensible on a screen and slightly less sensible when exposed to time, distance and human comfort. Anyway, travel is about the journey and not the destination.

    So the issue was that I had managed to not really think through the fact that the flight from Faro to Warsaw was four hours in length and then I discovered that the seating Gods had given me a middle seat. This flight was looking a little less appealing, especially as I knew that I was flying back to Spain the next day.

    This is where rail ticketing needs to improve across countries, it’s just too expensive at the moment and I ideally like to use trains. But it was going to cost me £18 to get from Faro to Bilbao (via Warsaw) which also gave me two lounge accesses. Google informed me that to get from Faro to Bilbao by rail required six trains, would take over 28 hours and would cost somewhere around £150.

    Security at Faro was efficient from a staffing perspective, but I was slightly inwardly annoyed that the passenger in front of me didn’t know that liquids needed to go in their own bag. This has been the rule for over a decade so perhaps I should be fair. There then followed five minutes while she located her various liquids spread across three bags, as though she had prepared a small toiletries treasure hunt for the benefit of airport security. I remained outwardly calm, which is one of my lesser-known heroic qualities.

    Anyway, after that, I got to turn right at the above sign for the first time, which means that I was heading from the Schengen area. Last time I went left and was faced with long queues due to border control requirements.

    I could see the non-Schengen area and the queues didn’t actually look too bad, although I still preferred the Schengen option of not needing to show a passport.

    I then popped to the lounge, but I wittered on about that separately.

    There were plenty of seats in the terminal, there were numerous power points and it all felt relaxed.

    We were departing from Gate 220 and the whole process was well managed and it was clear where the priority and non-priority passengers needed to wait. The staff here seemed rather laid-back and I noticed that they weren’t checking bag sizes.

    The boarding process was all well managed and we weren’t in the extreme Portuguese heat for long. Did I mention that it was too hot? The aircraft was 9H-WDX which I’ve been on twice before, although as it’s part of their Polish fleet, that’s perhaps not entirely unsurprising. The crew were Polish and were impeccable in terms of their friendliness during the flight.

    The middle seat arrangement isn’t ideal, but wasn’t problematic and I managed to combine sleeping with watching YouTube videos to make the time go a little quicker. The aircraft was clean, the pilots were professional and we arrived into Warsaw a few minutes ahead of schedule.

    Oh good, a packed bus from the aircraft to the airport. Although I was a little time restricted as I needed to cross Warsaw, I knew that there was no border control and so I would be able to get on the train quickly enough. That transpired to be true, it took eight minutes from getting to the terminal to getting on the train, which included buying a ticket from the machine.

    Overall, this flight cost me £9 and everything went as expected, so I was pleased with the whole arrangement. It’s rare that I get the middle seat allocated and the flight was relatively full, but there are worse things that can happen. Once again, I thought that Wizz Air’s operation was all well managed and I was delighted to be back in Warsaw, even if just for one night. It might not have been the most logical routing, but it was cheap, efficient and let me continue my little adventure.

  • Faro – Standing Under a Landing Aircraft

    Faro – Standing Under a Landing Aircraft

    My morning walk to the beach involved walking along the road next to Faro Airport, and I found it quite exciting to stand underneath the landing aircraft. I appreciate that some people require major cultural landmarks, dramatic landscapes or meaningful human encounters to feel enriched by travel, but I am apparently satisfied by a loud aircraft passing overhead at close range. Well, it excited and delighted me anyway, and that is enough. Not every travel highlight needs to trouble UNESCO.

  • Ryanair (Norwich to Faro)

    Ryanair (Norwich to Faro)

    When in the airport lounge, I could see the Ryanair aircraft arriving into Norwich.

    The flight to Faro was the last one of the day and so all felt orderly and well managed. It’s somehow a little better to be in the calmness of an operation about to close down rather than in the midst of chaos and overcrowding. And I don’t think that Norwich Airport is often overcrowded…

    We waited outside ready to board the aircraft. I do wonder if they might have covered this area, but maybe now they’ve stopped collecting their £10 departure tax perhaps that investment will have to wait. A new roof is all very well, but one must not rush into these decadent infrastructure commitments I suppose.

    Ready to board and it was aircraft 9H-VUJ, which I don’t think I’ve been on before.

    I rather like these little steps at the front and these are the ones that fold-up into the aircraft. This is really clever, it saves airport fees, it’s quicker and it allows them to land in more places.

    It’s a rather move convoluted affair to board using the rear steps, which definitely do not fold back into the aircraft.

    The seating Gods gave me an aisle seat and I was slightly annoyed to find someone sitting in it. He willingly moved, his logic was that he thought the flight would be quiet and so he would sit in the aisle seat rather than the window seat. I did rather think he could have just sat in his actual seat and moved later on, but I kept those thoughts to myself.

    As for the flight, the aircraft was a little grimy, but there is a limit to what the cabin crew can do in the 25 minute handover. The crew were friendly and helpful, but they appear to knock into the chairs with their trolleys more than Wizz Air crew. It seems that the Ryanair aircraft are slightly narrowed, as they use Boeing and Wizz Air using Airbus, so I suspect it’s just that. Or perhaps I was just in the trolley danger zone, which would be very on-brand for my travel arrangements.

    And safely in Faro. It was too hot.

    All of the European Entry System (EES) machines were on and the set-up here is that passengers go through the process using the kiosks and then a member of border force checks the passport but doesn’t stamp it. The whole process took around fifteen minutes which felt reasonable.

    The queue for EU citizens was longer but they only had to go through the EES machines and didn’t need to see a member of border control.

    There was one of the worst altercations I’ve seen at border control when two people at the neighbouring counter were told that they needed to step aside and wait for someone else to look at their passports. I don’t know why, but the two refused to move. The member of border control shouted at them to move back, then the border control officer who was serving me ran out of his counter and warned that they would be immediately deported. This rather raised the temperature of the room, which was already too hot in Portugal (as I may have mentioned) and therefore did not need further assistance.

    The younger of the two women cried and said that she was confused and didn’t know what was happening. I did feel some sympathy, as border control is not the ideal environment in which to become confused or muddled up, especially when the staff are now discussing deportation with the energy of people who very much mean it. But I also quite liked this little bit of excitement, in the limited and selfish sense that it was happening near me rather than to me. My own border control officer then came back and was lovely, which was reassuring. It is always pleasant when someone returns from threatening deportation elsewhere and then smiles at you.

    And here is the list of arrivals, because I remain committed to documenting the full glamour of international travel. Aircraft, queues, signage, crisps and border control tension: the modern European journey has everything.

    The whole flight was entirely agreeable and it was £20 which is more expensive than my Wizz Air arrangements, but I didn’t have to pay to go to Luton. In terms of efficiency, this worked out well as the Luton rail line was closed after the crash, so this saved a bus replacement service and allowed me to enter the European Union cheaply. A smooth Ryanair flight from Norwich, a local beer beforehand and only a modest amount of border control theatre at the other end. That is about as much excitement as I require from budget aviation. So, all rather lovely.

  • Wizz Air (Skopje to London Luton)

    Wizz Air (Skopje to London Luton)

    One of the slight annoyances about Skopje Airport is that I couldn’t complete online check-in in advance, I had to go and see a staff member at the Wizz Air check-in desk to check documents. Despite checking, the staff member at the check-in desks for earlier flights couldn’t check my documents, but he did tell me what desk would be opening and when so that I wouldn’t have to wait in a queue when my flight did open.

    It wasn’t the busiest of airports.

    The helpful check-in agent told me to wait at precisely this spot at a particular time. I looked like a very experienced traveller at this point and a number of people started to queue behind me.

    It worked, it meant I was at the front of the queue and was the first one through the security area and that meant I could have more time in the Primeclass lounge. I accept that there’s more to life than a free coffee and beer in an airport lounge, but there’s no point lingering about when that’s available.

    The signage, as ever for Wizz Air, was clear and there wasn’t long to wait despite the aircraft having been delayed.

    The aircraft was G-WUKY and this is the same aircraft that I was on two days before that got me here.

    This will interest no-one other than me, although that’s true for this blog in general, but not only was it the same aircraft but it was also the same row. This photo from my previous flight shows the window seat I had this time, so that’s handy planning in blog imagery terms. Some people arrange their lives around career development, relationships or spiritual growth. I appear to have reached the stage where I am pleased by the efficient reuse of an aircraft seating photograph.

    Wizz Air are very good at keeping the cabin relatively dark on late evening flights, they do their usual run of food and drink, but they did it quietly and try to avoid disturbing passengers. I was happy with my randomly allocated window seat as I fell asleep for half the flight.

    And safely back into London Luton airport and it was pretty much on-time as the padded schedule had enabled them to catch up. Unusually, there were very long queues for non-UK passport holders, I was through the border in under five minutes but it would have been a longer wait for those without UK or EU passports.

    Anyway, this was another £8.99 flight with Wizz Air where I was suitably delighted with the whole arrangement. The aircraft was clean, the crew were friendly, everything was just about on time and it was a stress free experience.

  • Wizz Air (London Luton to Skopje)

    Wizz Air (London Luton to Skopje)

    Another journey from Luton Airport, so another little snack at Big Smoke, this time the hot honey chicken tenders and a 0% Guinness. All very agreeable and a suitably balanced pre-flight meal.

    And that’s the end of Avalon, the little coffee shop, which apparently had closed just a few hours before. It was always a slightly quirky arrangement with some odd food and drink options, limited seating but always friendly staff. There appears to be a new Costa coming, which I can’t say delights me, but if that’s what the passengers of Luton Airport want, then so be it.

    My Lounge and the exciting beer option of 0% Heineken, although you’re only allowed half a bottle at a time. I thought half a bottle was perfectly sufficient.

    For about the first time I can remember, the cutlery was clean here. It wasn’t overly busy, this is a perfectly acceptable arrangement although for those not on Priority Pass or similar scheme, it’s expensive to enter for what is offered.

    “Plane on the way” means that it hasn’t arrived yet, but they’ll start the boarding process. Efficiency is important and all that, although they called the gate ten minutes early which felt aspirational.

    And here it is, sweeping in majestically, which is perhaps overstating the romance of a Wizz Air aircraft at Luton, but one must take glamour where one can find it.

    I have a temporary bag which isn’t very rufty tufty so isn’t going to be used for long on these expeditions, I’ll be repurposing it for LDWA challenge events at some point, where it can enjoy a quieter life being shoved into village halls and checkpoint corners rather than exposed to the brutal glamour of low-cost aviation.

    The aircraft was G-WUKY which is yet another one that I haven’t been on.

    The seating Gods not only gave me an aisle seat, but the other two seats in the row weren’t occupied during the flight.

    The prices are slowly creeping up, but they don’t feel unreasonable.

    And the sandwich prices. These are very much for the more wealthy people, it’s something that my friend Richard would order if on board, as he has the quiet confidence of a man who knows society needs people willing to keep the premium sandwich sector alive. And actually the premium sector everything…..

    Bearing in mind that I had a row to myself, the flight itself was relatively busy. As usual, this was another nicely operated flight with a friendly cabin crew, a clean aircraft and clear announcements from the pilots. No-one applauded when the aircraft landed and there were no issues of note during the flight, so I was once again impressed. Bearing in mind that I had only paid £8.99 for the flight, I felt particularly delighted and the fifteen minute late departure was caught up and we landed five minutes early. That’s the joy of padded schedules…..

    There were no more photos as the whole airport arrangement was far more efficient than I had anticipated. Border control took two minutes as there was no stamping of passports just a vague look inside and the airport was clearly laid out. Unusually for me, as I usually get a cheap bus, I had a shuttle from the hotel and that turned up just as I arrived outside. That means I was in a car within fifteen minutes of landing, so I didn’t have a chance to take photos. This efficiency does, admittedly, leave the blog slightly short of content, which is awkward given that the blog is rarely overburdened with plot at the best of times.

  • Wizz Air (Dortmund to London Luton Part II)

    Wizz Air (Dortmund to London Luton Part II)

    Carrying on from my previous post, I had settled into the gate area that was past border control and I had gone through the EES (European entry/exit system) and had my passport stamped. My flight was late and then there was an announcement that the flight was now on time and it would be departing from Gate 3. This was fine, until I realised that this gate was in the Schengen area of the airport and I no longer was. This presented me with a problem. I was now on the wrong side of border control, which is not generally where I want to be when an aircraft is quietly preparing to leave without me.

    So, I decided to go back to the border guard staff and mention the situation. They were helpful and told me that this was something of a mess, but they allocated me a police officer who walked me to my gate and around the newly opened border control area for the new gate.

    This was the scene until around shortly before boarding, as many other passengers hadn’t realised that they were now at the wrong gate. And, soon after this, there was something of a deluge of stressed looking passengers and numerous police officers who I assume had pro-actively rounded everyone up they had realised were in the wrong place. I think that everyone boarded the flight, but the queue for border control was thirty deep when boarding commenced.

    With that, it was time for me to board at least. It’s aircraft 9H-WNV, which is yet another Wizz Air aircraft that I hadn’t been on.

    Passengers were trickling on rather than the usual rush. The seating Gods had given me a window seat for the 80 minute flight and this was unusually for Wizz Air an aircraft that hadn’t really been cleaned from the last passengers. I think that this was more to do with Wizz Air trying to cut the delay so that we departed on time even thought the aircraft was late in, so more about efficiency than anything else.

    And there’s the aircraft I just disembarked from and I knew that this was my last flight for around a month, something I felt friends gave me insufficient sympathy for. Anyway, this was another £8.99 flight from Wizz Air with Multipass and it was smooth, efficient and the cabin crew were friendly as usual. The boarding process was a little sub-optimal, but I take into account the fare that I’ve paid and I can cope without jazz bands, champagne, silk cushions and whatever else decadent passengers might want. I also had some good news that my train from London King’s Cross to Ely was cancelled which meant I arrived into Norwich 75 minutes late and so got the entire £22 rail fare back.

  • Wizz Air (Dortmund to London Luton Part I)

    Wizz Air (Dortmund to London Luton Part I)

    My journey back home from Dortmund started at Dortmund Stadthaus metro station and all was going well at this point. Until I tried to buy a ticket and the card machine elements of the ticket machines were all down and not working. This I considered sub-optimal as I don’t carry cash partly as this is the 21st century and partly because I have a reckless optimism that ticket machines will work. However, in Lübeck I found 5 euros on the floor by the river and I suspected that, in a similar way to how computer adventure games work, that it would come in useful. And that was very much the case here, I used cash to buy my ticket and that saved me a thirty minute meander to the city’s central railway station.

    There’s the ticket validation machine and so I was good to go.

    I needed Aplerbeck and there was only a short wait for the U47 to turn up.

    A wait of five minutes to be precise.

    And here it comes, all as expected.

    I’ve posted about this journey before, but the metro stops at Aplerbeck and then passengers get a bus to the airport.

    And in what I think is the premium seat for a passenger to look out of the window. Well, in the absence of being the bus driver of course. There aren’t many limits to my ambitions, but becoming a bus driver is one of them.

    There’s no lounge at the airport, but there is a McDonald’s just a five minute walk away and I had a free coffee on my app, so I didn’t want to miss the opportunity. They also have power points and, as usual, I wanted to be fully charged given that’s one of my travel priorities.

    I had a relaxing ninety minutes at McDonald’s, bringing this blog up-to-date with about 65 ‘riveting’ posts about Lübeck. I use the word riveting advisedly, as some readers may not have known they needed detailed commentary on churches, airports, museums, railway stations and toilet pricing.

    Safely at the airport, which is really too small for the number of passengers that it gets.

    An interesting place to put a hopscotch game for kids in the middle of the queueing aisle. Nothing says efficient passenger flow quite like inviting small children to begin a structured jumping activity where everyone is already trying to stand.

    This is the downstairs area at Dortmund Airport which is short of seating space, poorly signed and only designed for non-Schengen flights in some sort of bid to test passenger resilience. However, I found a seat and prepared myself for the two hour wait for the flight, which at this point was delayed by half an hour. Anyway, my planned comfortable arrangement changed and I needed to find a police officer, but more in part two (who says I can’t build tension on this blog?).

  • Ryanair (London Stansted to Lübeck)

    Ryanair (London Stansted to Lübeck)

    The entrance to the security area at Stansted looked a little more glamorous than when I was last here. It was also a quick process with staff members that looked buoyant and not entirely worn down by life. The security process here means that liquids and laptops don’t need to be removed from bags, so it’s a bit quicker.

    There’s currently no lounge available at Stansted Airport, other than for certain flights, as Escape has closed (and I don’t know what is opening in its place). However, my Priority Pass card gives me £18 to spend at Camden Bar & Kitchen, so I popped there.

    I’ve never been upstairs in here before and it was much busier than I had expected, although that’s true for the entire airport. The team members here were particularly friendly and engaging, despite how busy they all seemed to be.

    This cost just under the £18 that I had, which seemed slightly expensive, but the quality was high. The toast was soft, the tomatoes and avocado had a richness of taste and the eggs were runny when I cut into them. The latte had some flavour and it was an enjoyable breakfast all round.

    Back in the busy main terminal and there was a shortage of seating. I think they must be adding more as the overflow seating area downstairs is currently closed, so I’m hoping that they have a plan.

    Rather handily all of the screens had this error message on the left hand side, a little sub-optimal for those wanting to see what gate to head to.

    Michael O’Leary, the boss of Ryanair, said this week that passengers shouldn’t be allowed to drink alcohol in the morning at airports. I have some sympathy for him on this, there were more drunken passengers than I’ve noted before, some being quite raucous before boarding. Unfortunately, much of this seemed to be facilitated by JD Wetherspoon and they lost a set of Stella glasses from one group who just took their beers to the gate.

    Anyway, there was some certainly some vibrant behaviour from a couple of groups which continued all the way to the gate. It was about a ten minute walk and I wondered why they had so many drunken passengers wanting to get to Lübeck. All became clear here though, the left hand gate lane is for Ibiza, the right hand gate lane is for Lübeck. None of the raucous passengers were going to Lübeck and this felt like something of a relief.

    I was the first one to the gate, which was more because the flight was quiet than because I had managed to become quite athletic.

    There was then just a short walk to the aircraft.

    It’s aircraft 9H-QDD which I don’t think that I’ve been on before, but it’s been part of the Ryanair fleet since 2016. The seating Gods had given me a middle seat, but this was ridiculous as the flight was relatively empty so I had all three seats to myself. I assume Ryanair did that in the hope that I paid extra in advance to move to the window or aisle seat. The crew were friendly and the boarding process was efficient and it felt mostly clean, despite the number of empty cans and bits of paper left from the previous flight. With the quick turnaround, there’s only so much that can be done though.

    Just after taking off and Liam and I walked the Stansted Stagger a few months ago which went around the airport, so we must have walked somewhere there.

    We flew over Groningen.

    And safely into Lübeck with the sun still shining so it was still too hot. The flight was only just over an hour and we landed 25 minutes ahead of schedule, although Ryanair do pad their schedules.

    The border control process with the new EES was time consuming and took just under 30 minutes and I was towards the front of the queue. The EU passport queue was dealt with quickly, so for those of us without an EU passport it is all a bit sub-optimal.

    The flight was £14.99, so more than my usual £8.99 that I pay with Wizz Air, but it’s cheaper for me to get to Stansted than Luton Airport, so it worked out pretty similar. The flight was efficient, the crew were friendly, the pilots were calm, so I thought that I received a bargain flight.

  • Wizz Air (Katowice to London Luton)

    Wizz Air (Katowice to London Luton)

    [Apologies I published this early if anyone saw a half finished post!]

    I was connecting at Katowice Airport to fly to London Luton, although there was no airside connection available. I also discovered that the security area at Terminal A wasn’t open for thirty more minutes, so the process was hardly rushed.

    Mine was the 19:45 flight and I had the advantage of popping to the airport lounge, but I wrote about that separately.

    The boarding process was all efficient, but there was a particular focus on checking bag sizes on this flight. The lady was walking down the queue and she spoke to me briefly before telling me that my bag was fine, but a fair few were being stopped and charged extra money. One guy was charged four times for his family, so around £320, so it was a profitable exercise for Wizz Air. Although, the rules are very clear, so the customers took a risk.

    This lady was charged £80, she might have been a little unlucky. It’s fair to say that she wasn’t very pleased and she asked a couple of us whether we’d been charged as well.

    The aircraft is 9H-WAD, yet another one that I haven’t been on before and this has been part of the Wizz Air fleet since 2022.

    Everything was smooth and well managed yet again, although the seating Gods had given me a middle seat which wasn’t ideal. However, the flight was only two hours so it’s hardly traumatic. The flight cost the usual £8.99 with my Multipass and the aircraft was clean, the crew were friendly and everything worked as it should.

    We landed into London Luton on time and I had a hotel just a short walk away from the airport, which is always something that I look forward to. This marked the end of my one week stay in Poland, Romania and Germany, another successful trip that was made a lot easier with my cheap Wizz Air flights.

  • Wizz Air (Dortmund to Katowice)

    Wizz Air (Dortmund to Katowice)

    Dortmund is one of the older airports which is simply too small to deal with the number of passengers it currently has to handle. There are over three million passengers using the airport every year now and they have been creative about using the space that they have.

    Mine was the 13:25 flight and I took this photo just after I went through security, showing how perilously close I was. Well, by my standards. The security process was slightly problematic as some drunk, mostly older, Polish football fans barged by a few of us in the security line. I decided to take the opposite security line to them and managed to get through quite a bit quicker, and certainly had a quieter time.

    And the aircraft arrives, albeit a little late. The seating arrangement at the airport wasn’t dreadful, but they do need more seats for passengers as quite a few just opted for the floor. There were no power points and the general facilities at the airport were quite limited, but everything seemed to work efficiently.

    I was slightly nervous of a delay as I had a flight from Katowice four hours after this one arrived, but fortunately, there was no impact of note.

    This is aircraft HA-LVD, yet another one that I haven’t been on before, with this one in operation since 2019. The seating Gods had given me a window seat near the back, which suited my needs entirely for a flight of a little over one hour.

    Somewhere over Dortmund.

    What looks like a pretty town, this is Soest in Germany.

    And safely into Katowice and we we hardly late at all, giving me more than enough time at the airport to sit in the lounge for hours….

    The flight cost £9 with my Multipass and was another competently managed operation, with the aircraft being clean, the crew being friendly and the pilots sounding professional. It’s becoming a bit samey I know with Wizz Air, but routinely good isn’t a bad thing…