Fly Maybe: part 2

Before leaving the hotel, I rang the airport and spoke to the airline representative. I explained my concern from my last trip to Edinburgh and wanted to make sure the airline had a back up plan. He tried to reassure me that there would be a back up plan but added "you may have to take a boat up North!"

Once I arrived at the airport to check in and drop off my luggage, I asked the check in steward about the flight status and weather in Wick. He said that everything was fine but told me to check my bag at the "oversized bag" check in desk. My bag's dimensions are 50x34x18/23 cm or 19¾x13½x7/9 inch. I didn't want to make a fuss, so I followed his instructions.

Behind me in line, was the family with their 10-12 month old baby from my first trip. I later learned that the airline made the baby's parents put airline baggage tags on both of the baby's feet. Does this airline consider babies to be the new baggage?

I felt like a tourist in the Edinburgh airport, snapping photos for foursquare, tweeting, etc, all this while I waited for my plane. The waiting was longer than I had expected. The plane I was finally told, was late coming from the North. My first thought was "at least there is a plane coming." The plane, to my surprise was packed. "Why are all these people coming up to Wick," I asked my fellow passenger. Her response, "not a clue!"

Once we finally boarded, an hour late, things were starting to look positive. Sadly things took a turn for the worst. The famous Haar had joined our trip meaning that we would try to land but that a back up plan would be created. We circled for an hour above Wick airport (our final destination) in the hopes that the Haar would disappear. After three attempts the pilot announced that we would have to land at another airport. The passengers beside me started betting on which airport we would land at. Would it be Orkney, Shetland, Inverness, Aberdeen or even back to Edinburgh? If only Wick airport and it's planes had instrument landing, then this would not be a problem.

The pilot decided to land the plane in Inverness, a 3-hour bus ride would then bring us to Wick airport. Upon landing in Inverness, we were told to go to the airline desk and await instructions on how we were to be transported to Wick airport. At the airline desk, the stranded passengers were given a £3.50 voucher. Unfortunately this did not even cover the cost of a sandwich. So much for looking after the stranded passengers!

As we loaded onto the bus, another passenger said how he thought there must be some sort of travel curse, explaining that this whole bus, train, no-plane experience had happened to him 4 times already. Maybe 2012 is becoming a crazy year to travel.

The bus driver was not as quick as the other driver and the road to Wick was bumpy and shaky, not exactly what any passenger wants to go through. I could help but think: "I hope I'm
taking one for the team!" This is in reference to all our guests visiting who have to take the same plane.