At the airport - fog is the new snow

28-12-10
We arrive at Paris Orly airport at 7:30pm and check in for our 9:20pm flight back to Southampton.
8:45pm we notice on the departure board that our flight has been cancelled and following a discussion with Air France staff we find out that due to fog in southern England no flights are being accepted at Southampton, so we are booked onto a flight to London City airport the following morning leaving Orly at 0710. Air France agree to put us up overnight in the airport Ibis hotel, so at 11pm we arrive at the hotel only to find the restuarant closed. So its off to bed as we have to leave the hotel at 05:30 the next morning to guarantee our place on the flight.
29-12-10
Awoken by the alarm at 05:00 we leave the room and cram as much cold buffet breakfast into ourselves (and hand luggage) as we can before taking the free shuttle bus back to the airport.
We check into the flight at 06:00 and head towards the boarding gates where we sit and watch the flight departure board.
07:15 and we're told that due to fog in southern England London City airport is also now closed and the flight is cancelled, we are booked onto another flight now going to Southampton leaving at 5:20pm we are told to pick our luggage up from the baggage claim,and given a voucher for a free sandwich and hot drink.
A long wait later
4:45pm the departure board tells us our flight has been cancelled so its back to the Air France desk where there's about 80 irate passengers shouting and yelling.
Calmly we manage to get ourselves booked onto the 7:20pm departure to London City airport so we sit back down and wait.
 6:30pm and surprise surprise the flight is cancelled, at this stage Air france admit that there will be no departures from Orly to England for the forseeable future.


As we have been hanging arround longer than most we are offered a flight leaving Charles De Gaule airport in 90 minutes going to London Heathrow, we seize the chance and jump on the next shuttle across Paris.The traffic is horendous on the periphique and we make it to the check in desk 10 minutes before the flight is due to leave, luckily because there are 20 of us in the same position they hold the flight back for us to board. The plane has now missed its take off slot, so again we wait finally we take off at 9:15pm arriving back in Heathrow an hour later at 9:15pm UK time.

After standing at the baggage claim until every last bag finds its owner the 20 of us late onto the plane head off to the baggage enquiry desks to find out what's happened to our belongings.
We are informed that due to getting onto the plane late our baggage didn't come with us and will arrive tomorrow afternoon.
Slightly p..sed off and tired we book a national express coach leaving heathrow at 10:45 getting us to Southampton bus station at 00:45.
A search of heathrow for an open restuarant proves to be fruitless, so its yet another sandwich and coffee at Starbucks.

30-12-10
00:45 and we're dumped by National express in Southampton bus station where we summon a taxi to take us to the airport where we can hopefully be re-united with our car.
We had pre booked the carparking and paid for the origional four days, but by now we have overstayed and I wasn't looking forward to doing battle to get the car out. Fortunately there are nice people out there and after listening to our story the guy at the carpark office lets us off the extra charge and we're free to get on our way.

02:30 Hungry, we pull up into a 24hour motorway service station, dreaming of culinary delights we head to the restuarant area where we are told by a very grumpy employee that everything is closed for cleaning, not being physically able to eat another sandwich we slug an expresso and head off down the M4.

03:30 Portishead, hungry and exhausted we fall into bed setting the alarm on my phone for 07:15 as we need to get down to Taunton for Jo's rescheduled chemo appointment.

07:15 The alarm goes off and I jump into the shower to wake myself up, "come on Jo" I say "get up" looking at the clock on the wall I inform her that its 25 past six.
 S..t !! its then that I realise that the phone must have automatically set itself to gmt when we landed.
As we're awake we decide to get up and leave early and have breakfast en-route as there's no food in the house.

The real 07:15 and 43 hours since our last one we tuck into an unhealthy hot meal at Sedgemoor services on the M5


What about the baggage I hear you ask, well .......that's another story !!