…and the answer to that cliffhanger is no! Honestly, I have never seen Heathrow in such a state…
Anyway, the hunt for the wheelchair began when we arrived back to Zagreb airport. The airport itself looks a little out of place with its architectural design seeming to have been ‘plonked’ in the middle of the countryside. We tried our luck at check in and managed to seek someone who, very kindly, went to Arrivals to double check that the wheelchair wasn’t there subsequently narrowing the search to ‘somewhere’ at Heathrow.
As in Lisbon, airport security is upstairs hence we were chaperoned through various backdoors which eventually led to an eerily quiet location ready to be picked up by the van which took us to the plane…here is where the mess starts! As Zagreb airport is fairly quiet, we taxied straight out to the edge of the runway and then stopped…the plane wasn’t allowed to take off because Heathrow weren’t responding to confirm the total weight was acceptable. After 20 minutes, we were off, 2.5 hours later, it was touch down and then stop. Due to staff shortages, flights were being delayed meaning all the gates were occupied meaning yet another 30 minutes on the airfield. We finally connected to T5 where the assistance awaited but it was then time to justify that one could actually sit in a chair without injury requiring the manager to come down to assess. The next challenge for them was to find Superbunny, luckily we were in deep conversation with two managers discussing the mess that Heathrow is currently in which passed the time!
After negotiating the chaos of passport control and passing through the baggage hall, it was time to head to T3 Lost Property via the Underground. Unbeknown to us, Lost Property closes at 4pm and, as it is dealt with by an external company, Heathrow can’t access that area after that time! Anyway, the wheelchair is now in the hands of an electronic system and will supposedly be delivered to Bristol when it is found…we will see!
My travels take me to Oslo in Norway next from the 12th – 15th September; one of the two remaining countries that I have yet to visit in Northern Europe. Once again we are flying from Heathrow…surely they will have more staff by then??