It was not night weather outside. Standing in the hotel lobby calling a taxi, it didn't look too bad. Out in it, the wind was bitter and the rain was bad. We headed for the bus station, had a quick hot chocolate and then hopped on the first available airport shuttle.
Sure, that meant that we were going to be at the airport roughly four hours before our flight, but we'd stopped over in Glasgow so we could be there early and nothing was going to stop us from making that flight. Nothing!
It was just as well that we did because there was a bad accident on the motorway near the airport which caused a bit of disruption as the day wore on. I'll admit, I was a little worried that the flight was going to be cancelled because of the weather. It was so bad that all the ferries were cancelled and numerous flights were being delayed as well.
We found out, after hanging out downstairs for a while, that since we'd already checked in online, we were free to head through to Departures.
That meant going through the security gauntlet. Last time I flew I had a case to check, so I packed my awkward stuff and wore easy to take off shoes. This time we were hand luggage only and I found it incredibly stressful stripping off my coat, shoes, emptying my pockets, pulling out toothpaste from the pocket where we'd packed it. I'd been prepared for it, but it didn't make it any more enjoyable.
Especially as there was kind of a bottleneck once you got through security with everyone frantically trying to re-dress and re-pack their stuff. Our bottle of vitamins dropped on the floor and spilled everywhere which was almost the final straw, but we were through, we could go get seats and chill.
Which is what we did for the next three hours or so.
There was a male voice choir performing in the Departures area, which provided some much needed entertainment. I took advantage of the hour's free wi-fi on offer and caught a few Pokemon. Mr Click got a bite to eat and was really thrilled about getting a pager so they could let him know when his food was ready:
He was so thrilled, he had me take his photo!
Eventually it was time to board our plane so we walked what felt like the entire length of the airport to get to the gate. They've changed the layout a little since I was there last so this was both familiar to me, and yet not familiar at all.
I really felt for the people who were on the Stornoway flight which was affected by the weather. Around the time we were queuing at the gate an announcement went out that their flight was cancelled and they were all asked to collect their luggage and head to the desk to be told what would happen next. A little bit of me was half expecting our flight to be next.
But it wasn't and after a LONG way to get onto it, and a longer wait for it to be refuelled, we were finally ready to go.
We posed for obligatory plane selfies (I am so not a selfie taker usually) and admired the view:
It was a bit of a bumpy take off. As we got into the air the plane made this weird noise and we were immediately hit by turbulence. I'm not the most relaxed of fliers so this did not make me feel so good. It seemed to take forever for the seatbelt sign to go off as well and we spent a good twenty minutes just climbing through lots of bumpy cloud.
But once we were through we did get to see the sun for the first time in over a week!
Looking at that photo, you'd never believe that the weather on the ground was so bad!
The descend was a lot less bumpy than the take off, though it appeared to be just as wet on the ground in Bristol, but we had arrived. It was time for Christmas to begin properly.
Ah, so you got above the weather.
ReplyDeleteYep. It was much nicer up there!
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