Book a flight for 04:40!

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This wasn’t the best flight, nor was it the cheapest or most time efficient but it is definitely scheduled for the appropriate time!

Furthermore, I was able to use the whole of a voucher I was credited when a flight I had booked was cancelled by the operator due to more strict Corona restrictions coming into force at the end of 2020 so that’s good.

I guess me making this booking is only the first stage so I will update this post with my ticketing, departure and flight experience… until then, I’ll look forward to seeing my Mother on her Birthday!

I love you, Mum! x

Update:

Two days after I booked this flight, I got an email to tell me that the 04:40 departure time of the first flight has been updated to 05:10. Right now I’m content because I bagged the challenge and get to set off at a more reasonable time and have a shorter connection time but am just hoping that this is not the start of more messing around with flights being delayed and even cancelled – that’s how I ended up with this voucher in the first place!!!

Thankfully post -booking but pre-flight the realisation set in that Qatar is still on the UK’s ‘Red List’ and so this would mean I had to stay in a Government-backed quarantine hotel for my entire stay – utterly pointless!

I took the opportunity to move this Qatar flight to later in the year and re-booked with Saudia direct to London Heathrow. This allowed me to use a credit voucher for another flight that was cancelled back in 2020.

Somewhat disappointingly, the flight is not at 04:40. Nonetheless, it sets off a day earlier so I gain an additional day in the UK and will be travelling in seat number 40!

The original flight may have been cancelled but I sat in seat 40 on the one I replaced it with!
Post arrival; so it continues…

God laughs at people who make plans…

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Damn Corona virus… I now find myself in mandatory self-isolation after a flight back from the United Kingdom almost 2 weeks ago.

Clearly I need to adapt my training to suit this unusual and unexpected set of circumstances but with the threat of events being cancelled, it’s casting a blanket of uncertainty over my current schedule.

For example, the Manchester Marathon has just been postponed, most likely to later this year…

Ironman have written to me stating that they expect ‘substantial and widespread event postponements in the coming weeks and months’ so i can only hope that this blows over well before August!

….and the flights I’ve already booked are now at risk, for example:

I remember a motivational quote that said ‘it’s not the strongest that survive, it’s the most adaptable to change’ so this pandemic and our response to it is going to be a good test of that maxim.

Good luck, everyone….