Tuesday 6 March 2018

On easyJet and things…

After a number of years suggesting it I have finally persuaded Mrs Sixwheeler to take a short trip to Lisbon. I’ve always heard good things about the city but had never even been to Portugal. Anyway today’s the day.

Bristol Airport is a nice enough place of its kind and a Tuesday in March is fairly quiet; since we were last there in 2016 the car parks have been enlarged and appeared to be full so things can’t be doing too badly.

We were good and early as I don’t like to make travel stressful so allow plenty of time for everything. Getting through security was OK and I’d never complain about time taken there if it assures me a safe flight. I do suspect that the young man there was perhaps new to the task and keen to impress with his fastidiousness but hey ho; I did however feel that he was a touch over enthusiastic with the body pat down he gave me after my metal knee set off his alarm, but whatever floats your boat matey.

easyJet have, yet again, changed the rules. You get to take ONE small item of hand luggage and that’s it. Unless you either pay about fifty quid each way for an extra bag in the hold or you join some club they run for about two hundred pounds a year. To me this is clearly easyJet milking it; I can manage comfortably with hand baggage and bits in my jacket pocket but what really pisses me off is the amount of baggage they let on that is clearly bigger than what they say is allowed. That plus the fact that there isn’t sufficient space in the overhead lockers for every passenger to put a bag so when we got to the gate we were told that our bags would have to go in the hold. This was at no extra charge other than the time lost when we arrived, and this just seems unfair until you realise that easyJet have come up with a solution for you to avoid the problem; you pay them to let you board before the other passengers. Hmmm. Frankly I don’t care for this but on our particular flight easyJet made up for it by having the most efficient, kindest, politest, most humorous cabin crew I think I’ve ever flown with and that makes up for a great deal.

The sun was shining and it was very pleasant when we arrived at Lisbon and we had a simple journey on the Metro to the Hotel Marquês de Pombal where we are staying and where we have a very comfortable room with good views across the city.

We were recommended a local restaurant, Ribadouro, for dinner which we easily found after a short walk; we were made very welcome by the excellent staff and enjoyed a really delicious dinner.

Then back and to bed for an early start in the morning to start exploring Lisbon.