Oct
03
2008
There’s still more to tell about Thursday, when I took a long roll around Wroclaw visiting seven of its big tourist attractions, but I decided to save talking about it for Sunday, when I’ll have time to add some photos and links. So, forgive me the out-of-sequence posting as today I’m going to wrap up my trip diary by talking about coming back to Dusseldorf.
9:12 am. There was almost no traffic on the roads this morning, so we made it to the airport in record time. There are only two people ahead of me in line to check in, but there is already a very long line for security. The problem is that there are only two security gates for this departure lounge, but there are four full flights leaving in the next 2 hours, so they tend to get backed up.
My advice is that if you’re flying out of Wroclaw, get to check in and then go straight through security. There’s nothing to do on either side of the gate anyway, and you might as well be where you’re supposed to be.
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Sep
29
2008
9:55 am. We’ve reached our crusing altitude, the fasten seat belt sign has been switched off, and the man beside me keeps sucking his teeth. And here’s me without my noise-reduction headphones.
Just as we were leaving the terminal, the five missing passengers for the Turin flight showed up. It was the businessmen who were getting their seats changed when I was in line. They thought it was very funny and said they couldn’t hear the announcement in the VIP lounge, but that it didn’t matter because the plane wasn’t due to take off for 10 minutes.
The aisle on this tiny plane is so narrow that the aisle chair scraped the sides of the seats all the way down to row 10. I think I learned a new word in Turkish when the assistance crew member trapped his hand between the aisle chair and the seat.
They didn’t do a security demonstration on this flight. Now how will I know how to unbuckle my safety belt?
And more importantly, why am I in such a snarky mood this morning?
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Sep
29
2008
6:11 am. Time to get up. If my body even thinks about protesting at the earliness of the hour, I’ll remind it that before Lufthansa opened the Dusseldorf-Wroclaw connection, I had to get up at 3:15 to catch a flight out of Dortmund when I wanted to visit my second home. For now, I’m lying in bed, letting myself have a moment to properly wake up, and wondering why I didn’t put both brakes on when I was getting out of my wheelchair into bed. The left brake is dodgy, and I can only put it on when I’m in the chair, so now I have a half-braked chair that’s going to be more difficult to get into, and I wouldn’t mind so much, but this is the third time this week.
6:14 am. Done, in the chair, didn’t fall on the floor. Time to get moving.
6:55 am. I’ve never lived in a better situation for getting to an airport: Continue Reading »
Sep
24
2008
This week’s anecdote picks up from last week’s.
By the time the plane landed at Gatwick, I had composed several letters of complaint to British Airways, Euro Atlantic, and the management of Tampa International Airport, each more venomous than the last. To say I was annoyed is an understatement. Tired, sore, cramped and in need of a toilet, shower and bed, all I wanted was to be off the plane and on my way. That I had another flight to catch in 4 hours was not improving my mood any.
As usual, I sat and waited as the rest of the passengers got off the plane. The people who’d been sitting around me and had offered to help said goodbye, and repeated how shocked they were by the whole thing, in tones ranging from sympathetic to rabble-rousing. I would find out later that some of them would lodge complaints on my behalf. Once they were all gone, I waited for the assistance crew to arrive and get me off the plane.
And waited. Continue Reading »
Sep
20
2008
Imagine you’re taking a trip from Los Angeles to Cracow, and you’re trying to work out the best price. You have found some good deals for LAX to London Heathrow, but from there to Cracow seems expensive. However, you’ve found a low-cost airline running a flight there from London Stansted that leaves 5 hours after you land, and flying that route would be a significant saving. The two airports are both London airports, but could you make it from one to the other in time? 5 hours seems like a lot of time, and there is a coach that is supposed to get from Heathrow to Stansted in just 90 minutes: surely that would be a feasible option.
Well, much as it sounds like you could make it, you might want to think again, especially if you’re a wheelchair user. Continue Reading »
Sep
18
2008
London is certainly a well-connected city, with five large international airports connecting it to destinations worldwide. The two main airports, Heathrow and Gatwick, are well-known destinations for tourists and businesspeople from all over the world. The other three have flights to many European destinations, but few or no intercontinental flights. Stansted and Luton are well outside the Greater London area, and get most of their business from low-cost and charter airlines and cargo traffic, while London City Airport, situated in the Docklands of East London, serves the city’s financial district and seems to get more businesspeople passing through it than tourists.
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Sep
16
2008
Gatwick, (IATA code LGW) is the second major international airport in the London region, serving around 200 destinations and up to 35 million passengers a year. It has two terminals, North and South, linked by a rapid automatic transit train with a 2- to 3-minute journey time. Despite being smaller than Heathrow, Gatwick presents a little more difficulty to wheelchair users, so give yourself the same amount of time before departure if you’re flying from there.
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Sep
15
2008
With five major international passenger airports you certainly can’t complain that there’s no choice when it comes to getting to London. However, it can be a little confusing if you’ve never traveled there before. Which airport is the best one to fly into? Is an hour enough time to make a transfer within Heathrow? Can you transfer from Heathrow to Stansted? I’d like to kick off my look at accessible London by explaining a little about the five airports, starting with London Heathrow.
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