We live in Scotland but flights from Manchester were cheaper so on Friday we drove down to Manchester, stayed in the Hilton Hoyle that night and then got up at 3am to get our plane at 7.20. That was all fine we got to the airport and arrived at check in.
The lady at the desk says I'm afraid your flight is delayed we are not sure for how long but you will get an update at 8 am in the meanwhile we will give you some vouchers to buy food and drink. The Monarch airline lady that we spoke to estimated a 4 hour delay, but at 8 we would find out more information.
So 8 am came and the boards where it tells you if your flight is boarding changed from more info at 8am to more info at 9 am. Then at nine am it changed to more info at 10 am. By this time everyone was getting frustrated we got given more food and drink vouchers. Then at 10am it changed to estimated time of departure 18.20 ... What the hell... Everyone was going crazy at the poor people at the information desks were getting so much abuse and there was nothing they could so I felt sorry for them.
So then we got told that all the passengers would be bussed to the Hilton for a free lunch, be picked up at four and brought back to the airport. We decided to stay in the airport and use our food and drink vouchers to have Lucy in the airport Frankie and Benny's.
At 4pm the board changed yet again... This time to estimated departure Sunday at 2 am. This was getting ridiculous everyone had been up since at least 3 am that morning by 2am the next morning everyone would be dead!
So then they said they would take all the passengers to the Hilton and then take them to a hotel with a free room so we could get some sleep. We are still not sure why we are delayed And when and if we will actually depart because the time kept changing.
When we got to the Hilton (2mins away from airport) they said they would bus is to hotels 30mins away which had room and pick us up at 1 am.
Luckily we were able to get a room at the Hilton and monarch were going to pay for it.However the nightmare didn't end there...oh no...at 9pm my dad was looking at the flights on his iPad and noticed that our flight now said departing at 5.20 am that would be a 24 hour delay...24 hours!
Yet again we got some sleep and then went to the airport at 3am. We had already checked in the day before so we only had to go through security. And by everyone's surprise we boarded a plane at 5.15am. It wasn't a monarch lane it was an older more run down looking plane but at least it was a plane.
Once we were on the plane we then had to wait for them to get the bags of those who had not came back to the plane off the plane before we could takeoff.
At last at 6.30am, 23 hours after we should have taken off our plane took off the ground at Manchester airport!
The flight only took 2.5 hours and we touched down in sunny Malaga. We did half to wait over an hour on luggage but a least we got it and we had finally arrived in Spain.
So far we are loving our holiday even if it did get off to a bad start!
Laura x
