overyourhead

Getting to Bremen...
Well, its been a wild 24 hours. Thursday we flew out of Heathrow to Schipol where we were due to pick up a connecting flight to Bremen. KLM did their usual excellent service on the first leg but I should have s,elt a rat when we were put on a shuttle bus at Amsterdam for the second leg. The bus drove us through the airport past all the big shiny jets to a small field where the beat up old two prop rust bucket planes were kept. My heart sank when I saw the titchy plane we were hoping would get us to Bremen. Would it even make it off the ground? Would it stay in the air long enough for the hour long journey? Two other passenger obviously thought the answer to one or both of these questions was "No" and refused to board the plane. Cue ten minutes wait while they tried to find their baggage and remove it from the hold. When I say "the hold" I really mean the little cupboard at the back of the plane. Eventuqlly everyones bags got pulled out and strewn across the field. It must have looked like a plane crash from the air.

Once we were finally ready to go the propellors fired up and to shook, rattled and rolled down the runway. "We may experience some slight turbulence", said the pilot. Light? LIGHT?! It was like being flown in a cocktail shaker. Now I know how a squash ball must feel. To say I was panicy would be the understatement of the year. It was a very unpleasant flight.

When we eventually fell out of the sky at Bremen in a controlled smash landing I was ready to kiss the tarmac. That is also when I noticed the type of plane we had been flying. It was called a FOKKER. How apt.