Chris got toe the apartment for about 0400 and within 15 minutes we were on our way. Myself and Damo had already unpacked and repacked to make sure we were going to come in under the 20kg limit. The plan was to be at the airport for around 0415… and as it turned out we were the first BMI customers to check in that morning. Things seemed to be going well, but then we got news our flight was delayed. Heathrow was fogged in, but we were assured that all outgoing flights were also delayed. The problem was that we only had a 2.5 hour window in Heathrow to connect to Doha. We were delayed twice more and moved to 2 different different gates. The problem was that no matter what gate we moved to, there was no plane there. No plane no fight.
Eventually we took off over an hour and a half late and landed in Heathrow with 47 minutes before the flight was going to be taking off. As it tuns out, fog only effects incoming flights and not out going. The fog of Heathrow was incredible. We could see out the window of the plan and we knew were descending for landing. The clouds looked to be very low. We entered the cloud thinking that once we get through this we will be landing… then out of no where, in the middle of the cloud wee saw the runway. Visibility was somewhere between 15 and 20 meters at the very most, but even at that you could only make out shapes.
One the plane stooped and we were allowed off, we ran from our gate in Terminal 1 to Terminal 3. Damo and Chris set the pace while I struggled with Asthma and the several cups of coffee I had already had that day. We got to the Qatar airlines desk but we were told it was too late and they wouldn’t check us in… but worse yet, Qatar Airlines were refusing to endorse our tickets and told us there was nothing they could do for us.
We decided to head back to BMI to see what they could do for us. As it turned out the timing of that decision was crucial. We got into the very long queue for the help desk at BMI. I decided to head back to Terminal 3 to check the other airlines to see availability of flights that could get us into Asia before Christmas. The only options were to Singapore on Christmas Eve or to Hong Kong that day, but with no connection onwards from Hong Kong.
BMI told us that Qatar had to honour our tickets and got us on standby for the next 3 flights to Doha. If we made any of the flights to Doha that day, we would have to overnight in Doha because we would have missed our flight to KL. At least this option had us going in the right way, and had Qatar back honouring our tickets. We headed back to terminal 3 and to the standby list. There were already 13 people ahead of us on the list, so it wasn’t looking good. They took our tickets off us and started checking in the others. We were still in play. As luck would have it, we got on, and even better we were sitting beside each other. We got our tickets and ran… taking all the short cuts through security we could to get there. The flight must have been delayed by a few minutess so we were ok and they were only just getting ready to board the plane. We had no idea where our luggage was. BMI had told us it was in Heathrow waiting to be claimed while Qatar said it was on the way to Doha.
The flight was fine, helped along by the fact we all took sleeping tablets. Our attention had to turn to what we were going to do in Doha. Any flight to South East Asia would do for us. We landed and got through security and went to the transfer desk. We already knew we had missed the flight to KL, so we asked to get on any flight going to either Singapore or Bangkok. The guy took our tickets and started working on them. He talked for with a few people and made a few phone calls… we didn’t actually know where we were going, but we new we were still in play. He took us up to the departure gates and hand wrote us tickets, as it turns out to get us on the flight to KL which had been delayed by an hour because it was late leaving KL on the other leg. If we had of misssed this flight, information we later learned, we would of been spending Christmas in Doha. This flight was the last flight between Doha and KL till after Christmas. After landing in KL, we went to see if our luggage had managed to keep up with us. Not surprisingly it hadn’t.
We checked into our apartments, had a shower and went to the Mega Mall to get some essentials to get us through that night and the next day. Mum and Dad were having a BBQ later on, but we needed non air plane food now. The plan had been to have breakfast in Heathrow, but that plan had gone out the window. Mum and Dad’s house is fantastic. It was the first time I had seen it since it was a building site. They are obviously enjoying it a lot. We headed back to the apartment… and to bed. What a day.
