The Anonymous Widower

A Take-Off From City Airport

I filmed this take-off from the Royal Victoria Dock Bridge

Note the SS Robin in the lower right of the video.

July 14, 2011 Posted by | Transport/Travel | , | 2 Comments

easyJet Commit to Southend

This story is good news for me, as it’s a better alternative to the dreaded Gatwick.

June 16, 2011 Posted by | Transport/Travel | , , | Leave a comment

Memories Of Deauville

With the G8 summit being in Deauville in the next few days, I’m reminded of a few stories from  the French seaside resort.

The first time, C and I went, we drove along the coast after taking her first red Lotus Elan over on the ferry. It actually was the only overseas trip we did in the car, before she replaced it with the one that I still own.

We did all of the usual touristy things, like seeing the Bayeau Tapestry, the Mont St. Michel and the port of Honfleur, but two things stand out.

When we went to the races, we parked the car next to a Ferrari Testarossa.  It was immediately surrounded by French kids, which I think says a bit for the pysche of the French, who tend to prefer the small and perfectly formed like Piaf and Sarkozy. 

We also were sitting in a cafe in the main street, enjoying a good lunch, when a guy drove up on the opposite side of the street in a BMW convertible and showed everybody how to park a car in a space that was a metre or so too short. He just shunted the cars in front and behind until the space was large enough. Everybody in the cafe enjoyed it and gave him a good Gallic cheer, when he locked his car and walked away. Unfortunately, we had virtually finished lunch and had to move on, so we never saw the end of the story.

We did go to Deauville a couple of years later in my Cessna 340A with our middle son and his friend, Andy, for a day at the races. We had a good day, but at the end of the day we were treated to one of the worst displays of bad manners I’ve ever seen.

When you want to leave a small airport, you fill in all the appropriate paperwork and then go to your aircraft, request permission to start your engines if required and then when that is complete, you request permission to taxi. Deauville was quite busy that day, with several aircraft wanting to leave. So as you do, we just formed an orderly queue until ATC gave us permission to enter the runway and takeoff.

But this wasn’t good enough for one American.  He just passed the queue in his private jet and to various cries of “Sacre Bleu!” and “You don’t have permission!”, he just lined up and took off. What an idiot!

When the man died a few years ago, I actually felt relieved that such a rude man had gone.  It is very rare that I do that!

Sadly there are many more rich, famous and very rude these days.

May 26, 2011 Posted by | Business, Sport, Transport/Travel, World | , , , , , | Leave a comment

An Uplifting Moment

There is an old Chinese proverb that says that a long journey starts with a single step.  This is actually a mistranslation of Lao-Tzu. A better form is “Even the longest journey must begin where you stand.”

What it doesn’t say is that there are a lot of steps in a long journey.

I was walking down Upper Street this lunchtime and I saw an aircraft crossing over the Angel. Even at that distance, I saw it was a biplane and despite my supposedly bad eyesight, I thought it was a de Havilland Dragon Rapide.

de Havilland Dragon Rapide Over Islington

This picture was taken when it crossed in front of me, as I stood by Barclays Bank at the start of Essex Road.

So why is this an uplifting moment?  I seemed to be the only person who spotted this iconic aircraft from the 1930s  and despite my dodgy eyesight, I was able to identify it and then take several photographs.

My only regret was that I only had my little Nikon CoolPix.

So perhaps I’ve taken another step along that long road!

May 4, 2011 Posted by | Health, Transport/Travel | , , | 1 Comment

Air Travel Is Losing To Rail

There are some interesting statistics, which show that people are using trains more instead of air travel on popular domestic air routes.

As an example in 2006, 50% of passengers travelling between London and Newcastle used trains, whereas in 2010 it was 64%.  Overall on the ten busiest routes the market share has increased from 29% to 44%.

I think this is good news, as trains emit a lot less carbon dioxide for the journey.

April 24, 2011 Posted by | News, Transport/Travel | , , | Leave a comment

Let’s Ban Duty Free on Aircraft!

I never buy anything in duty-free shops when I fly.  I used to buy perfume for C, as that is very different to say spirits.

The difference is the weight and the inflammability.

As a former pilot, I know a lot about flying and the physics of it. One of the ways to make aircraft more fuel efficient is to not carry any excess weight on the plane.  And making planes more fuel efficient means they emit less carbon dioxide to create more global warming! So you get aircraft makers and airlines trying hard to be green and then the authorities allow them to bring on excess weight, that they could buy at the destination airport.  

There is now pressure from some countries to allow liquids to be carried on aircraft again.  And that includes duty-free bought in another place.

So security will get tighter and queues will get longer, which will mean more delays and probably more carbon emissions.

All of this could be avoided by banning duty-free on aircraft.  But then airlines and airports would say it will make flying more expensive, as duty-free subsidises the tickets!

And another thought! Budget airlines make a charge for each bag.  Why not add a weight charge for every passenger and their baggage?

It could have some interesting secondary affects.

April 11, 2011 Posted by | News, Transport/Travel | , | Leave a comment

London’s Sixth Airport

London has five airports that use the name.

  • Gatwick – I hate Gatwick with a vengeance, as I’ve never had a pleasureable experience in the airport.
  • Heathrow – I want to avoid Heathrow, as last time I arrived I was in a wheelchair.
  • Stansted – I have many pleasant memories and it’s very easy for me to get to.
  • Luton – It’s a nightmare by car, but then I can’t drive and it’s an easy train drive.
  • City – I’ve never used it, but it’s easy to get to by bus to Bank and then the Docklands Light Railway.

The title of this post was because a friend has to go to the Isle of Man a lot and I wondered why he went from Liverpool. Looking at prices, I would assume it’s cost, as there seem to be lots of flights from Liverpool to the Isle of Man at just under £40.  From London City, the prices seem much higher.

So how would you get to Liverpool Airport from London.  Virgin will do it with one change at somewhere like Crewe in about two and a half hours for £35 from Euston. With me that would be about £80 for the trip.  A train leaves Euston about every half-hour that connects, so you can judge the journey fairly fine.

So on this basis, is Liverpool an alternative airport for those passengers going from London to the Isle of Man and other places served by the airport?

April 9, 2011 Posted by | Transport/Travel | , , , , | 5 Comments

David and Samantha Cameron Set a Dangerous Precedent

If I go back three years or so, C and I would often take a weekend away by flying from Stansted and staying in a good, well-reviewed, but not necessarily over expensive  hotel.  In fact in the year she died, we did it three times to Nice, Majorca and Valencia.

So it was good to see David and Samantha Cameron doing exactly the same thing last week to celebrate her fortieth birthday.

But have they set a dangerous precedent?

Wow betide a politician, who takes an expensive break, except in the summer! The tabloids will have a field day. 

I particularly like their flying on budget airlines.  So they did fly Ryanair one way and easyJet the other, but I suspect this was probably mre to do with fooling the press and security than anything else.

We perhaps will never see the Queen on a budget airline, but there have been many reports of her travelling to Kings Lynn for Sandringham on the train from King’s Cross. As I’ve regularly used First Class on that line, I may have actually sat in a seat she has used.

April 8, 2011 Posted by | News, Transport/Travel | , , , , | 4 Comments

Welcome to the United Kingdom

If I thought Gatwick was a disgrace going out, it was only because I hadn’t tried it going in.

It was like entering a building site and it was a long walk to passport control, which seemed to have been set up by vaguely clearing an area of the site. I’ve seen better facilities in countries that are very much less wealthy than the UK.

There was no signage to the trains and yet again trains south of the Thames were very badly organised.  It appeared that I needed to go to Platform 1, but after getting to the platform and finding one of the invisible staff, he said I needed Platform 4 for London Bridge.

To be fair the train arrived on time and there was a 141 bus waiting to take me home.

If you compare Gatwick to St. Pancras, it’s like comparing a twenty-year-old Skoda with a modern Jaguar.

It’s the last time, I’ll use that dump.

March 31, 2011 Posted by | Transport/Travel | , , | 2 Comments

A Fast Ferry Home

It may have been run by a company called Fast Ferries, but it still took four hours to get me from Tinos to Rafina on the Greek mainland.

A Fast Ferry

I hadn’t eaten any food since a very good moussaka on the Sunday at lunch time and as I left early for the ferry, I didn’t get any breakfast.  At least a supermarket was open on Tinos, at which I was able to purchase a couple of bananas. Where would coeliacs be without them?

On the ferry it was just coffee and chocolate and there weren’t even any Greek salads.

It didn’t get any better at the airport either, as there wasn’t anything in the cafes which didn’t have a large slug of gluten.  No Greek salads and not even any of those sesame snacks you usually find in Greece.

So I had a choice of either getting the midday easyJet flight or retreating to Athens and getting a flight on the next day.

I chose the flight, as it appeared there were quite a few seats and as it turned out, two of us had three seats for the journey to Gatwick.

So the flight was good value because of the extra room.

I was also back home in good time.

March 31, 2011 Posted by | Food, Transport/Travel | , , , | 1 Comment

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