Day 42 - Airports

We were up early for our scheduled 09:00 flight back to BA. Waiting for it, the airline announced the plane had a technical problem (bad battery) and they had to delay the flight!

The airline is a start up in its first year of operation and has only four planes. The passengers almost revolted, demanding they put us on other airlines to BA.

We had a scheduled flight back to the US at 22:20 tonight so, when the airline said we'd be flying about 13;30, we were ok. We sat around the airport and took advantage of the meal vouchers they gave us. 13:30 came and went and now the flight was to be at 15:00. Then to be at 16:30. The passengers fumed, the airline wouldn't provide much information and 16:30 passed. Finally they said the "rescue" plane with a replacement battery was to be there at 18:00.

Now we were getting worried about missing our US flight. The rescue arrived and we took off about 19:00 for the two-hour + flight. We got into BA about 21:15, only an hour before our flight! We had to leave from a different airport a half an hour away and figured we'd never make it. As we were de-planing, I got a message that our US flight had been delayed by 40 minutes so we caught a cab and raced to the other airport. When we arrived the checkin was already closed but I went to the United office and they checked with the boarding crew who said they were still boarding. We checked our bags and cleared immigration and made the flight only moments before they closed the door. Whew!

With the take off delay, however, we figured we'd not make our connection in Houston. The ten-hour flight from BA was good and we were a only a bit late. We breezed through immigration and customs, checked our bags, and made our Dulles flight with ten minutes to spare. United got us in to Dulles early and Holly was waiting there to take us home.

A great trip!Read more