by Alexander | Jun 30, 2004 | English, Travel
Stansted is as far away from London as Lübeck is from Hamburg. It’s a shame that it’s called London-Stansted as you might think it’s just another airport near London. Instead you have to take a bus or the Stansted Express to London. That’ll add another £24 for an open return ticket (valid for one month to London and back to Stansted, can also be bought during the flight for £22) or £13.90 for a cheap day return ticket (valid only one day) for the Stansted Express to your fare. The guy selling me the tickets was nice enough to sell me the open return ticket instead of the cheap day return ticket, thus doubling the price on my credit-card bill. So watch out what they’re doing when you buy your tickets.
We arrived at Liverpool Street Station at 12 o’clock. I reserved a table for lunch at the Fifteen for 2 o’clock. The Fifteen is located near Old Street Station, just two stations away from Liverpool Street Station, so we had plenty of time and decided to head right south to the River Thames and the London Tower. Just then, we heard the bad news: No tube today. The whole tube staff was on strike the one day we where in London. Thanks a lot guys!
Nevertheless we headed south by feet and had a very nice walk through the city to the London Tower and the Tower Bridge. I really like the bridge’s architecture and it’s impressive bascule mechanism. If you ever spend some time in London, you should take the guided tour and view it.
Have lunch at the Fifteen…
by Alexander | Jun 30, 2004 | English, Travel
We started our tour early in the morning on wednesday going to Lübeck Blankensee Airport (LBC). Wow! What an airport! I’ve never seen such a small airport in the middle of nowhere.
We arrived there at about seven o’clock as RyanAir asks you to check-in two hours ahead of schedule. Well, at Lübeck you don’t really have to – the main hall with the check-in desks was literally deserted.
After a futile hour of waiting we could finaly check-in and pass the passenger controls to get into the fully RyanAir branded departure tent. This really is a big tent, one of those you’re used to from fun fairs or street markets. Filled with some aluminium camping chairs and tables and a small coffee-bar on one side it resembles some kind of a holiday atmosphere. There are also several exits labeld with RyanAir’s destinations from Lübeck. The Stansted exit is on the other end af the tent seperated by customs and passport check where suddenly a large queue arose – one hour before the scheduled take off. I’ll never understand people queing up in such situations instead of waiting a couple a minutes for a less crowded moment to pass such a bottle neck. It was easy calculations:About an hour of time until take off, a maximum of 130 passengers to go through customs. We relaxed and had a coffee. After that, passport check was vacant again.
Next up was the ugly part of flying RyanAir: The call to arms! When the attendant showed up at the tent’s Stansted exit everyone ran to that exit to get on the plane fast and to get some good seat. Well, the seats are all the same I think – so…
Flight time was from 09.20 to 09.45. Different timezones make up for very fast flights!
Head on to famous London…
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We arrived at Liverpool Street Station at 12 o’clock. I reserved a table for lunch at the Fifteen for 2 o’clock. The Fifteen is located near Old Street Station, just two stations away from Liverpool Street Station, so we had plenty of time and decided to head right south to the River Thames and the London Tower. Just then, we heard the bad news: No tube today. The whole tube staff was on strike the one day we where in London. Thanks a lot guys!
