Scenes from Queen Street Saturday 12:08 - Hobo in flip flops rummaging through bin on an overly bright and hot sunny day... Posted by Picasa

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Did the UK Government kill the travel industry?

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A recent flight to Nice has highlighted that not many people are flying. In the middle of August, on a Friday night, shops and restaurants were closed at Heathrow. You didn’t have to worry about finding a seat to relax. There were plenty of them, even with the social distancing boards in place. While it was lovely to have so much personal space, on the other hand, you couldn’t help but wonder about the future of travel, particularly when airports in Europe don’t seem to be as burdened by such rules. And when none of this “Covid theatre” prevented the delta variant from entering the UK in the first place. Perhaps people are voting with their feet due to the complex rules and scenarios. Leaving the UK for any trip seems to be determined to confuse the confound the most seasoned traveller.  Despite the pages and pages of guidance on the government website, nothing is straightforward. Perhaps there are so many scenarios they attempt to cover that anything is possible.  There are t...
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Flying Crumbs: British Airways during the pandemic

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So what's the deal with British Airways? Even if you wanted to fly this year, the chances of flying anywhere with British Airways seemed low with their last-minute cancellations and changing of flight schedules that made flying with them impractical.  Despite their attempts to get past customers flying with emails promising dream holidays, one suspects part of their poor summer performance is due to poor planning. With their endless reschedules and cancellations, it was as if they didn't want your money. It's a legacy carrier with not only planes and technology stuck in a time warp. Their attitudes to flying and getting people moving needs an update.  Terminal Five at Heathrow this summer was a vast empty chasm. The shop hoardings are promising a better future, replacing the hordes of tourists. But whether this future will be with British Airways remains a wonder. Flying in the UK now is a kafkaesque experience with the ever-changing and expensive tests and form-filling. A...
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Chaos and Control: Taking back control part 1

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"Kastam" is licensed under CC0 1.0 For those sitting out European holidays overseas at the moment as either the places you want to visit have quarantine or you'll have to quarantine on your return, there will be a little surprise in store. Travelling now as a third country, you'll find your British Passport doesn't get you as far (or as quickly) to your destination that it once did. And that's not due to the Covid checks. While passport control will take less than a minute to check your certified Covid test result, what will take longer is the manual entry of your passport details into systems. What used to be a relatively quick check and waive through now takes so much longer.  Arriving at Bari airport last week on a flight barely two-thirds full, we had to wait almost an hour. Covid checks contributed to some of the delays as people haggled over their test results - or lack of them). But the most significant delay was the need to type everyone's passpo...
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