Sunday - Delayed flight

Got the bags packed (rucksacks), doesn’t take long and I had already done my toiletries decanted into small liquids size from
Venice and Amsterdam.

Good drive to the airport car parking place and into airport and a coffee and sandwich in Pret. All looking good till around 4pm when noticed that flight cancellations were being announced. Didn’t know what it was then at that point. Our gate was called, away at the other end of the airport Gate 14. Arrived there and it was mobbed! Didn’t understand why . Managed to get a seat, which was next to Pilar and Arial. A couple from Czechia on my other side. The reason I know this is that the big problems came to light as announcements started coming to the many hundreds of people waiting in this area. Many flights cancelled due to IT outage for ATC! The couple from Czechia had their flight cancelled and Ryanair staff were announcing that they would have to stay in a hotel and keep receipts for claiming back and to book flights tomorrow. We were waiting to hear that ours would be, but Pilar told me that our plane should be here as it goes out and then picks up passengers in Seville to come back to Edinburgh. Kept fingers crossed this was the case but we were looking at flights tomorrow Malaga for Monday if the worst happened. (Btw Jet2 had flight for £38 quid to Malaga ! And then we would have had to get train or coach to Seville.

Had a good chat with Pilar as we waited for news. She’s a schoolteacher and lives in Stirling married to a Scotsman but from Seville. Arial was a lovely lad, bi lingual of course. He played with his games spoke to us and just generally was a great wee boy and no phone given to him . He was a star. Used to airports and travelling his mum said. We even got a Christmas card from her.

Thankfully around 1815 IT systems were fixed. Phew. Four hours later but at least we got there!

Arrived through passport control around 1am and splurged on a taxi straight to the hotel. €30 well spent. By the time we were sorted out we got to sleep about 2:30am. Thankful we got here.