Waiting
Who hasn’t spent time hanging around an airport due to some unforeseen delay?
The first time I ever flew was back in 1977 and my flight was delayed in departing from Melbourne for something like 9 hours. The first few were not too bad. I’d never been to an airport before and David was with me so we explored, we looked at the planes from many different airlines, we got something to eat. I didn’t want to leave the airport because I had no idea how long my flight would be held up. No handy apps to let you know back then. In the end, David had to leave, he had come to Melbourne to see me off on my trip but I had to see him off as he was getting the train back to Adelaide that night. I read the book I had brought to take on the plane and when we eventually took off sometime around midnight I waved away the flight attendant who was serving dinner (at 1 am) and went to sleep.
That was probably my worst experience with airport delays. I don’t fly that often but if I go on a holiday or to visit friends and family in Adelaide or Melbourne I generally have to fly. Hobart airport is so small that there really is not much to do, the larger airports in Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide offer a few more places to eat and a few more shops but as I don’t have a great interest in fashions, shoes or bags they don’t really hold my interest. I usually visit the newsagents and may buy a book or a magazine but generally, technology is what gets me through long waits if I’m on my own.
Flying to and from Adelaide from Hobart usually involves a change of planes in Melbourne or sometimes Sydney. Occasionally they can be three or more hours. So what do I do? Well, I usually try to travel with my camera in my hand luggage so I can use the downtime to take some photos at the airport. I also have my Kindle for reading and I take advantage of free wifi at the airport to read blog posts, answer comments and sometimes even write something. Most of the photos in this post were taken while I was entertaining myself during an airport layover.
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Those runways are a big help if you have trouble walking! My worst hangup was more than 40 hours at Heathrow. We weren’t allowed out of the lounge because we were from out of country, so they left us there, sitting on our suitcases for the whole time. I have never voluntarily flown British Airways since.
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Oh nearly two days at Heathrow must have been deadly. Why do airlines treat people so badly? I would never fly with local carrier Jetstar after two female employees stood and watched Naomi and I struggle with their “self check in” in Melbourne. We had a suitcase, hand luggage and a handbag each and all they did was tell us how to use it. Didn’t want to ruin their nails I guess. We found the runways in Singapore’s Changi airport helpful but the one in Sydney I photographed is really short so it seemed a bit pointless.
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