Oma and Opa have successfully escaped back to the US, thwarting further attempts by Eyjafjalla to keep them here.
In the end, their return flight was delayed six days. Dutch air space had reopened a couple of days after they were originally due to fly out, but not before their rebooked flight was also cancelled, forcing them to the back of the queue once more.
When they did finally get out, the wind had changed direction and Keflavík airport was now closed: unfortunate, because they were flying with Icelandair via that airport. Instead, they were rerouted via Glasgow, where they experienced a three hour delay while passengers returning to the US from Iceland were flown in from Akureyri in the north of Iceland, a four hour drive from Reykjavík.
This all meant that they didn’t get home until nearly midnight local time, having had to abandon the wait for their second suitcase in order to make it to the bus on time for the ride back to Providence. It makes me grateful to be so conveniently situated to a major international hub.
Hopefully their bag will turn up soon. Of course, the one time we successfully persuaded them to purchase cheese to take back with them, it ends up in the mislaid bag.
Recent geological events have made me realise how much we take air travel for granted. There was a point during that unplanned third week of their stay with us that I was wondering whether we weren’t all failing to face up to the fact that Sarah’s folks now effectively lived with us. After all, commercial aviation could have been suspended for weeks or months, rather than mere days. It’s hard to imagine that big business wouldn’t have found a way around that, public safety or no public safety, but long term suspension was looking plausible for a while.
I’m due to fly to Ireland for some Brendan Perry gigs and a family visit at the end of May. I was starting to wonder whether the disruption from the volcano eruption might last until then. Of course, there’s no guarantee that the volcano won’t blow its top again in the coming weeks, which could throw a major spanner into my plans, but barring that, things seem to have more or less returned to normal now.