firth1974

Mission Impossible 3.

Sorry, im not a member of PA, so i have no i idea!

Justin Long

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With such good weather at the moment in London, i thought i would take my camera out for a walk down along the River Thames. The plan was to walk along and stop at every pub for a beer, but there seems to be quite a few pubs within a very short walk of each other around Kew, and that means i only got this far today.

It's not as bad as it actually looks.

Great photos Baz, thanks for posting. One of the many places I've wanted to get to, but never made it. Hopefully get there in June.

The Great Escape.

Wild Hogs

Charlie Sheen

Do you believe everything that politicans tell you?? If this is true, then i would guess the price of flights will go up first, so as to compensate for the loss of tax.

I doubt it to be honest. Didnt it get raised only a couple of years ago?

Best Western Hotel La Corona..................... Located on M.H Del Pilar Street, corner of Arquiza Street, in the Ermita district of Manila. Its on the same street as the very famous Manila bay/L.A cafe, for freelancer heaven( and at midnight, what a heaven it was, i loved it). It is also (literery) a stones throw from the U.S Embassy, and also located very close(within a 3 min walk) to the walkabout hotel and The Southern Cross hotel for the bus service to Angeles. I believe this is one of the cheapest rooms that i could of booked here, but for the price of £45 per night, with a buffet breakfast included, it was pretty good value to be honest. I never managed to make it down for the breakfast the 2 nights i stayed there, so i cant comment on the qualilty of the food, but by all accounts its meant to be ok. The bed was large, and for a bed in Asia, very soft as well and i had no problems falling asleep in it. All the usual TV cable channels(160+) and a very good wifi signal as well. Inroom safe, big enough for your cameras and money etc, but not big enough for a 15"laptop. 2 free bottles of water, which are replaced every day. Reasonable priced minibar full of goodies too. (ate a pack of cookies from the minibar, and then discovered they were only 10 peso cheaper in 7-11). 7-11 AND Jolly Bee's are located just over the street, so pretty much everything is covered. The huge Robinson's Mall is no more than a 10 min walk away as well. The hotel is VERY GUEST FRIENDLY, no problems taking back more than 2+ ladies. The door boy at night will take their I.D card and call you when they leave to ask if everything is ok. Not much view out of the window. But this room is located on the back side of the hotel though.

I have to say I am also impressed with Etihad customer service. They seem to listen and go out of their way to sort out any problems. I also started a thread a while back about my expericence with them. £235 must be the best part of 30-40% of the original flight cost anyway, so not exactly cheap to change. Did you book your original flight through Etihad or through a different source? The reason I ask is, back in October I booked to fly Emirates to Clark (last year),but needed to change my departure date by 7 days after I booked. As I booked though ebookers, I made my call to them to change, and had the flight changed for £75. If I had called Emirates direct to change my flight, that would of been £150 instead! Sometimes it pays to ring other numbers(presuming you didn't book direct with the airline).

Lethal Weapon emmmmmmmmmm, i'll pick #4.

Payback

I believe the official line now from the Malay's is that the plane has been hijacked.

It seems it is worth it to complain. Checking on Facebook lately, Etihad have been having quite a few problems with fog and delays in Abu Dhabi in the past 8 days. It was only because I read about these problems and heard Etihad offering Miles and/or free flights that I decided to chance my arm and see what happened!! Seems I decided right for a change.

Sometimes its good to complain. 6 weeks ago I endured the journey to hell to get to Bangkok, so I decided to email Etihad and complain, and this is what happened............. Good morning Etihad Airways, After making a post on your Facebook page regarding delays, whoever it is that replies to posts on that page(on your behalf), advised me to email you with my comments and information regarding a flight delay on Monday 27th January 2014, due to land in Abu Dhabi on that date. I was aboard flight EY 18 out of LHR, inbound to AUH. We were due to land at 07.10am, but due to fog we couldn't. After circling for 2 hours, at approx. 09.00am the captain said due to fog and a now (serious???) problem with the undercarriage, we were now being diverted to Al Ain. After landing in Al Ain, we were kept aboard that plane for 2 hours before a decision was made with what to do with us. That's 2 hours, with no food, only ONE DRINK being served, and your flight staff couldn't even be bothered to re-turning on the IFE, so as to give us something to do whilst waiting for such a long time!!! So, after sitting aboard your aircraft( a very nice A340-600) for 2 hours, we were than herded aboard buses for our journey to AUH. Bearing in mind we are now 4 hours delayed. Half way through this next stage of our "journey", your bus drivers refused to pull over and let people off to use toilets. We did actually park up after 1 hour, but that was because the drivers wanted the toilet and still wouldn't let us off either!!! Now, I understand that that none of us actually had visas to be in the U.A.E, but surely they could let us off to use the toilet!!! That's just common courtesy and partly good customer service and relations. Eventually, the drivers relented and we could get off and relieve ourselves. Eventually, after a very long journey we finally made it to AUH, where, it was a pleasant surprise to actually find that you had held our original Bangkok bound flight (EY 404). Very little information, actually no information at all, was dispensed by your airport staff regarding the delay and other issues arising because of the delay. Infact, your staff just wanted rid of us, get us out of their hair and onto that flight!!!! EY 404 was due to land in Bangkok at 19.45pm, but because of this delay, we actually landed around 01.00am approx. My paid for taxi that was waiting for me at the airport had already arrived and left without me, and because of this delay I had to forgo that cost of the taxi, and also my first nights accommodation in Bangkok as well!!! Now, im not looking for a refund for that, or toeven be reimbursed, but after reading on Facebook about another flight delay of 6 hours and offers being made to compensate about this with Etihad guest miles, I would like to know if you would consider making me an offer of free miles onto my Etihad guest account or maybe even a free upgrade next time I fly with Etihad?? There are so many different and cheap options of flying from London to Bangkok, that I may have to change my preferred airline of choice to one of your other competitiors, if you cant take care of your guests that have being affected by delays. If you would like to look into this, the information for my flights was,....... 26 Jan 2014 - 27 Jan 2014 London Heathrow Airport 20:20 TERMINAL 4 Abu Dhabi International 07:10 TERMINAL 3 EY 18 Confirmed Economy Saver 27 Jan 2014 Abu Dhabi International 10:40 TERMINAL 3 Suvarnabhumi Airport 19:45 EY 404 Confirmed Economy Saver Booking reference TPxxxx Eticket number 6072121xxxxxx Frequent Flyer Number EY1000xxxxxxxx I look forward to hearing your reply to my email. Yours sincerely, Mr Chris ---------------------------------------------------------------- And then 2 days later, I get a reply back from Etihad.............. Ref: 205xxx Date: 09 March 2014 Dear Mr. Chris, At Etihad we place great importance on maintaining the highest levels of personal service and hospitality. Clearly on this occasion, we were not able to provide this to the standard that you, or we, would have liked and for this we offer our sincere apologies for the disruption that the flight delay caused. Disruptions are inconvenient and unpleasant and I am sorry that you were caught up in this situation. Whilst we do not undermine in any way the disappointment caused however, we sincerely hope for your understanding as safety is always our first concern. We would never compromise the safety of our Guests or crew irrespective of any consequential disruption or service difficulty. Notwithstanding this, most disruptions to our flights are caused by factors outside our direct control although this is of little consolation to our customers and crew. It is my sincere hope that you can accept my apology for the delay experienced, in addition we would like to offer you 20,000 Etihad guest miles to be awarded to your account as way of a goodwill gesture, these miles can be utilized towards future Etihad flights and/or any of the 6000+ rewards available on the Etihad Guest Reward Shop. www.etihadguest.com I hope that you will accept these miles as an extension of our apologies for not meeting the expectations. If you wish to avail to our offer please confirm so the Etihad Guest miles can be added to your account accordingly. It is my sincere hope that you will be able to put this experience behind and continue to travel with Etihad in the future. Yours sincerely, Hamza Omishat Guest Affairs Officer Etihad Airways ------------------------------ Upon checking my Etihad account online, the miles have been credited to my account, and ive also had my account upgraded from Guest( bottom level) to Gold card. Extra miles, lounge access and all the other usual benefits. Well done Etihad for listening to your customers and making me happy. Sometimes, its good to complain.

http://www.speedtest.net

Blown away

I flew into Cagayan de Oro as I was meant to be travelling down to Illigan City to meet a girl I met on DIA, but to cut a long story very short, I never went there and decided to stay in CDO instead. Stayed at the VIP hotel, in the heart of the city. A nice little hotel, and quite cheap, but i'll post a hotel review for here later. Cut to the chase, CDO is just your bog standard run of the mill Filipino city, full of shopping malls and nothing else. I was now here for 4 nights, I was climbing the walls after the 1st night, but nevermind, I made the most of it, and the town isn't too bad actually. Here are just a few photos of what this town is like............

Ok. I've flown KLM a few times but never flown China Airlines. Check out this link, as it's going to have some great information for you on it....... http://www.airlinequality.com/Forum/china.htm

Are you actually flying KLM out of Amsterdam to Bangkok, or are you flying China Airlines??

Lone survivor