Day 13 - Ending CANCELLED
Short one today, but basically: we're still in London!
We woke up at 3 AM in Basel and quickly headed across the street to the bus to the airport (the only bus running that early in the morning). We are sad to leave the hotel in Basel as the stay was so short and the shower has been the best shower so far.
Check-in and customs at the airport went smoothly, and we got on the plane to Heathrow- a row all to ourselves! The flight was very short as both of us immediately fell asleep upon takeoff.
Our first plane was very weird as it had only 3-3 aisles all the way through, so "business class" just had cup holders in the middle seat. Also here's sunrise from Heathrow!
We got to Heathrow with a few hours to spare, so we walked around the terminal, ate an English breakfast at the lounge, then went to the gate. The A380 is a huge double decker plane, and we were very excited as we rode up the escalator to get our nice big seats, a meal, water, and be home!
Thumbs up! But little does she know...
They began boarding everyone on time, but then shortly after kicked everyone who had gotten on back off, and stopped boarding. It was a "short technical delay" that would add up to 1 hour before boarding.
Well 1 hour turned into 2. Then they took all of the jet bridges off of the plane. Nick went to investigate what was happening on the other side of the plane and it looked like this:
Tie ran on. One by one, each of the (four) pilots came out too look at the issue. We couldn't really tell what the issue was, but one guy would keep trying to crank a giant lever arm, then stop, then they'd all look at it for a sec, then another guy would try the same thing.
One pilot came up and gave an update saying it would be another 15 minutes, then they'd need to do an engine test and that would take 45 minutes, then we could go.
We waited another 2 hours and the plane STILL looked like this:
Soon they had like 8 cars and 10 guys all trying the same wiggly lever thingy. Nobody came with new parts, tools, or anything- they all just kept cranking on this lever.
After almost 5 hours total (and a short trip for us to another terminal to get a beer and a sandwich) they finally cancelled the flight outright. When we came back from our "lunch" we found even more maintenance cars and vans around the engine, with something like 15 or 20 guys standing around it and the engine covers all off.
The airline gave us a hotel voucher and shuttle to the hotel voucher. Unfortunately, the A380 holds 460+ people. And all of those people needed a hotel. We all got put in the same hotel and same shuttle. So, after waiting to get our bags back (yes all of our bags) and going through customs, the line for the BUS to the hotel took another hour! Then the line AT the hotel to get a room took another 20-30 minutes. No wonder they waited 5 hours to pull the trigger on cancelling- this is a lot of money to spend on hotels versus plane repairs!
While waiting for the bus, Nick rebooked our flights, staying on the phone for over an hour trying to find any seats. Being that it's the weekend before Christmas, all of the flights for tomorrow (Saturday) are understandably full. The closest flight we could get that didn't have a layover was on MONDAY, and the seats weren't even together. We'd have to spend 3 whole days in London! The logistics and uncertainty of that nauseated us.
Luckily, while we were in the long line for the bus, the guy behind us told us he went to the counter (which we couldn't go to because we used our credit card travel portal to book the planes), and there was still room on the Sunday flights. Nick called back and, after another hour on the phone, he was able to get us seats on the Sunday flight, AND they were together, AND they were business class (ooooOOOoohh). We don't know why or how, but the second person we called was much more helpful than the first I guess.
The hotel is OK. We get free dinner and breakfast, and it is buffet style. Dinner had some peas and carrots which were extremely comforting. There was a nice veggie channa masala for Lauren, and chicken legs for Nick. The room is an ADA room and the water from the shower gets everywhere. The faucet is loose and lopsided.
Tomorrow we will check out of this (free) hotel and check into one Nick found at the airport terminal. While it isn't covered by British Airways, we have trip insurance which has confirmed they will cover it so that is nice. This will be extremely helpful for our plans tomorrow in which we go SEE LONDON.
That's it for now. We are very tired and have basically been up since 3 AM and the delays, cancellation, rebooking, and hotel mess have drained us for the day.
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