Joburg to the UK
As an expat I make frequent long haul trips to the homeland.
I can’t always plan these trips in advance to take advantage of special offers
or travel outside of holiday times. I can’t plan when the next heart attack
will be that I need to return home for. So as a result trips tends to be booked
last minute. Usually with around a weeks notice. I compare prices, take into
consideration the routes, the length of time for a stop over. I don’t fancy 9
hours in Dubai airport even with the use of the Emirates lounge.
I usually fly emirates, as I can fly into Birmingham where a
friend will collect and return me, but the downside of this is I’m in transit
for 24 hours.
My last trip I had about 3 days notice that I was going and
the only flight available in economy was with Virgin Atlantic, direct to Heathrow.
I flew with virgin direct last year and
to be honest the thought of catching a tube into London and a 3 hour train trip
to Malvern after an 11 hour flight, plus passport and collecting luggage didn’t
appeal to me again. But having little choice unless I wanted a 12 hour wait in
Cairo, I flew with Virgin.
Now don’t get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with Virgin
but I do prefer travelling with Emirates. For example on my last trip I was
able to change my flight 3 times for less than £20 a time. Even if I have to
catch a train from Birmingham its around £15 instead of £40+ from Heathrow as
like I said I don’t always know when I’m flying to book train tickets in
advance.
Already planning next years trip. I’ve just booked a one way
ticket for my 1 yo who leaves SA in January and the 14yo flight is a return
from SA so he flies back to school on January 10th and returns end
of July. They're flying with BA for the first time.
Hubby and I are planning to spend Christmas 2014 in the UK, so all I
have to do now is book my Easter trip to the UK, but you never know what may
happen between now and then so I’ll guess I’ll just stick till the last minute
as always.
