Skip to main content

The worst Eurpoean airports

Anyone who has travelled will find this piece, from the IHT, about some of Europe's awful airports, resonates in many ways. Travel is supposed to be pleasurable - at least for the casual vacation-traveler. No longer. Read on - and reflect on your own horrible experiences:

"As we sat for an hour waiting to deplane at Leonardo da Vinci Airport from a short-haul flight this year, the pilot got on the public address system. "Sorry," he intoned. "Everybody knows this is one of Europe's worst airports."

At the time it seemed hard to argue: After the 50-minute flight and the wait to get off the plane, we would wait another hour around a carousel before receiving our luggage.

But these days, there is intense competition for the title of "worst airport."

Each year, the World Airport Awards, given by an air travel research and consulting firm called Skytrax, honor the best airports. Only a few in Europe made the top 10 this year: Munich is No. 4, Zurich is No. 6, Amsterdam Schiphol is No. 7 and Madrid Barajas is No. 10. The top three are in Asia, while no U.S. airports made the list.

While passenger numbers have skyrocketed in the past decade, airports have expanded in a makeshift fashion, leaving travelers to hike longer and longer distances. The treks are best suited for marathoners, doable for fit mortals. I am not quite sure how people with children or those who are elderly or have disabilities are expected to handle them."

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Reading the Chilcot Inquiry Report more closely

Most commentary on the Chilcot Inquiry Report of and associated with the Iraq War, has been "lifted" from the Executive Summary.   The Intercept has actually gone and dug into the Report, with these revelations : "THE CHILCOT REPORT, the U.K.’s official inquiry into its participation in the Iraq War, has finally been released after seven years of investigation. Its executive summary certainly makes former Prime Minister Tony Blair, who led the British push for war, look terrible. According to the report, Blair made statements about Iraq’s nonexistent chemical, biological, and nuclear programs based on “what Mr. Blair believed” rather than the intelligence he had been given. The U.K. went to war despite the fact that “diplomatic options had not been exhausted.” Blair was warned by British intelligence that terrorism would “increase in the event of war, reflecting intensified anti-US/anti-Western sentiment in the Muslim world, including among Muslim communities in the

An unpalatable truth!

Quinoa has for the last years been the "new" food on the block for foodies. Known for its health properties, foodies the world over have taken to it. Many restaurants have added it to their menu. But, as this piece " Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa? " from The Guardian so clearly details, the cost to Bolivians and Peruvians - from where quinoa hails - has been substantial. "Not long ago, quinoa was just an obscure Peruvian grain you could only buy in wholefood shops. We struggled to pronounce it (it's keen-wa, not qui-no-a), yet it was feted by food lovers as a novel addition to the familiar ranks of couscous and rice. Dieticians clucked over quinoa approvingly because it ticked the low-fat box and fitted in with government healthy eating advice to "base your meals on starchy foods". Adventurous eaters liked its slightly bitter taste and the little white curls that formed around the grains. Vegans embraced quinoa as

Climate change: Well-organised hoax?

There are still some - all too sadly people with a voice who are listened to - who assert that climate change is a hoax. Try telling that to the people of Colorado who recently experienced horrendous bushfires, or the people of Croatia suffering with endless days of temps of 40 degrees (and not much less than 30 at night time) some 8-10 degrees above the norm. Bill McKibben, take up the issue of whether climate change is a hoax, on The Daily Beast : Please don’t sweat the 2,132 new high temperature marks in June—remember, climate change is a hoax. The first to figure this out was Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe, who in fact called it “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people,” apparently topping even the staged moon landing. But others have been catching on. Speaker of the House John Boehner pointed out that the idea that carbon dioxide is “harmful to the environment is almost comical.” The always cautious Mitt Romney scoffed at any damage too: “Scientists will fig