OT: how is Northern Europe?

Wonderful story, Sarah. It's heart-warming to hear of such thoughtfulness and effort. . In message , Sarah Dixon writes

wow, he has had a great adventure getting home. well done to your DH.

here in NZ if ya cant fly you're stuck til there are flights going into the country or area you want to go. right now they are telling folks stranded here it might be early to mid may before they can fly home to UK and Europe. as all hotels are full up and/or folks are out of money for accommodation there was a call put out for locals to offer a room for travellers to billet in til they can fly home. they only needed a few dozen but got offers from nearly 100 locals. if i were feeling up to it i'd of offered too but i cant even look after myself. j.

"Sarah Dixon" wrote ... And he's home!!! After 12 trains, 5 countries, and over 36 hours sat on a train! The ferries at Calais worked all Saturday night and by yesterday morning were accepting foot passengers. DH says that all the people in the tourist offices and train stations were really helpful - some had gone to work on their days off just to help the people stranded.

sarah

Good ol' NZ hospitality! That's a wonderful gesture from those able to billet. My twin in Melbourne was wondering whether that has been offered there. She can't really help either as she works 10 hour days with travel time. DH and I are off to Japan in 3 weeks, luckily that direction is not affected. However, our quilt guild is sponsoring a quilt teacher from The Netherlands at the end of May and I understand she was going to the US first (Jacqueline de Jonge - does any one in the US know about a possible schedule for her????) Bronnie Cheers Bronnie

Good ol' NZ hospitality! That's a wonderful gesture from those able to billet. My twin in Melbourne was wondering whether that has been offered there. She can't really help either as she works 10 hour days with travel time. DH and I are off to Japan in 3 weeks, luckily that direction is not affected. However, our quilt guild is sponsoring a quilt teacher from The Netherlands at the end of May and I understand she was going to the US first (Jacqueline de Jonge - does any one in the US know about a possible schedule for her????) Bronnie Cheers

Has he managed to get back? Spain doesn't seem to be as badly affected as more northerly europe so I hope he manages to get back!

Sarh

Wow, he made it!! Bet he's tired.... What a way to see Europe!!

Our local airport at Toulouse remains open, there are just no planes to use it! Further north I believe that they are all closed, but then we are only 2 hours or less from the Spanish border, so we are quite a way down.

Janner France

DSonIL, a pilot based in Leipzig, Germany, was a bit lucky and arrived back in UK a few hours before the whole thing started. He's currently in London for the various tests/training that pilots do every 6 months. Apparently a lot of his colleagues are stranded and the airline are having a job keeping track of where everyone is. They know where the planes are of course, but presumably stranded pilots don't just sit in a hotel/airport waiting. All pilots have been told to make sure they are well-acquainted with procedures to restart engines while flying (sounds fun).

There seems to be a bit of controversy as to how dangerous it is and some airlines may challenge the ruling's legality. The news said that KLM are doing a bit of experimental flying to see what happens. No one seems to know if problems in the past have been from planes actually flying through the middle of an eruption, but really no one really knows.

We had a little old WWII Spitfire buzzing around here on Saturday, it sounded incredibly noisy. Apparently only jet engines are affected.

Sally at the Seaside ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~uk

Janner wrote:

They've just announced that most airports will be opening tomorrow, and BA are hoping to start some long haul flights from 16.00. However, it seems that it will be several days before everything returns to normal - there are so many passengers waiting to fly and so many 'planes in the wrong countries. They stressed that in the main it would be 'airports opening' and not 'planes flying'. One of the tour companies said it would be Thursday, at least, before their 'planes would be in service.

DS is very pleased as he'd just been told that his firm were sending him to New Jersey (he'd not sure exactly where) for 8 weeks at the beginning of May, and he was wondering if it would be a slow boat!

Sally at the Seaside ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~uk

(snip)

Jo,

I love that song, my mom used to sing it to me when I was small. Thanks for reminding me.

Judie