London, snow, airports, and dodo birds.

I thought Louisvillians were bad about snow-pocalypse panics, but at least we usually get 6-12" in a proper snowstorm. London came to a halt with a mere dusting. To be fair, snow's unusual for them (unlike Louisvillians, who should be used to it by now), and by morning there was about an inch of accumulation of good, proper, snowball-making snow. The streets, however, were clear and safe. The sidewalks were a bit treacherous -- as it goes in a community a much less litigious than America. I happen to like the whole, just be careful and if you fall, it's your own fault attitude. But maybe that's just because I hate shoveling my own sidewalk.

We would never had bothered flying to London from Edinburgh before (with airport travel time, it actually takes slightly longer than the train, door-to-door), but some amazing friends had British Airways miles to spare. Also, surprisingly, even without miles, the plane is sometimes cheaper. Also, it was fun popping on a plane and an hour later touching down in London. And browsing duty-free is more fun than sitting on a train for four hours.

Still, I forgot how much I despise Heathrow. Usually I can't stand them because of their harsh immigration officers -- drilling and drilling obvious tourists and being just plain mean at times (hey, it's like being asked for a hall pass when you're obviously going to the library!). This time, however, I remembered that Heathrow is also horrible when it comes to inclement weather.

On Saturday evening, the airport canceled 30% of flights in preparation for delays and weather-related incidents. We rescheduled to another flight, which was then also promptly canceled. Thanks to technology, we were able to figure out that really it was just Heathrow that was the trouble-maker. The flights out of London City Airport were on-time and running, so we switched our flight there and ended up back on time. Stupid Heathrow!

Sooooo ... I now have two tickets to sell on the Heathrow Express train, which runs from Paddington Station to Heathrow, if anyone would like to make me an offer? We paid £68 for these round-trips (this is a sensitive subject, and I don't want to talk about it) and used the first part of them (Heathrow to Paddington), so maybe they're valued around £34 now? 34-ish?L Make me an offer, and I'll pop them in the mail to you. I don't plan on heading back to Heathrow any time soon.

Check back later this week ... I'll talk more about adventures in London, including fun with Dodo Birds and the Queen.



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1 comments

  1. jogscotlandfromwestwoodsFebruary 7, 2012 at 6:35 PM

    we got stuck in toulouse airport because they don't as a rule do snow-so on sunday when they had oodles of the stuff they closed the airport!
    still we're back now & had fun sprinting for the plane in brussels airport-so now i can say i've been to belgium!

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