Planes, Trains, Automobiles and Volcano's
OMG WORDS-stay with me folks, this is an epic!

Last year, there was a group of 10 of us on the way to Puerto Banus,in Southern Spain for the Boss' stag do.
We arrived at the airport in Birmingham in timely fashion, and loitered around waiting for the check in to open.
As we waited we noticed an unusually large presence of heavily armed security and police, which we kind of commented on but pretty much ignored, knowing that in a few short hours we would be hammered and surrounded by fit birds.
Talking of fit birds, who is this tiny china doll goddess approaching us in airline uniform? It's Cassie, she seems lovely, I wonder what she's going to say?
"I'm sorry, the flights are all cancelled due to the Volcano in Iceland".
The airline had clearly hedged their bets, and had sent a very pretty young thing who no one could possibly shout at, it would be like bollocking a kitten for being a bit fluffeh, and we could only stand agape as the airport slowly emptied and various mutterings from other groups of angry people confirmed that the story was true.

Well that's the weekend fucked! BUT NO!
The boss has spent a fucking fortune on a 12 bedroom villa for us to destroy, and he wasn't going to let a small issue like no flights stop us from getting to Spain! A plan formulated in his mind, oh so quickly, and he grabbed his suitcase and belted towards the monorail thing that would take us to Birmingham New St station. We followed, bemused.

He paid for us all to go on the train to London.
He then paid for us all to go FIRST CLASS on the Eurostar to Paris, and then paid for flights from Paris to Valencia.
He then hired 2 cars (tiny, tiny cars) and we fucking DROVE the rest of the way to Puerto Banus, where we arrived, 12 hours later than scheduled, in the pissing down rain, and proceeded to get fucking ruined for 2 days! Then we had to get home.
We hadn't thought about that. At all.
OOOPS.
A quick call to the Mrs confirmed that we were, indeed, stupid cunts (she had alluded to this when I called her from London on the Thursday) and we couldn't get back, due to the ash cloud.

Now, in our group, were 5 of 7 dept managers from the company we work for, and we were all meant to be back in work on the Monday. This was Sunday morning, and we were stuck.

No, we are not stuck. We have Cars. Tiny, tiny cars.
5 of us, and all our luggage, decided we HAD TO TRY to get back, for our families, for our jobs, for men everywhere who had been defeated by mother nature.
We packed a shit load of stuff into this tiny tiny car, and crammed in, and set off to drive the WHOLE LENGTH of Spain. Which took 24 hours. We holed up overnight (after a very dodgy Chinese meal, which I think was mostly dog) in a F1 hotel, which is basically where long distance truckers go to kill hookers. The bed was 2 ft wide and made of rock.
At 5 in the morning, we needed to be off, and after our three hours of kip/non kip we were back on the road, to leave the rental car at entirely the wrong place (we no longer cared) and took a taxi over the border into France. We aimed to get a train across France, to Calais, and get a Ferry home.
OH NOES! France is having an industrial strike, and there are no fucking trains. We loiter around the arse end of wherever the hell we were, trying to come up with another plan. The Mrs at this stage had texted me to say there is no point going to Calais, as all the Ferries were booked solid, and the Navy were getting involved to get people home, but we faced a wait of at least a couple of days.
No we don't, not us! Not we brave few.
We got another taxi to the nearest airport, had to wait for someone to drop off a car which we could then drive almost the full length of France to Dunkirk. This car was tiny. Tinier than the other tiny cars. And it had no air con. And the windows were stuck. But fuck it.
We drove, another 12 hours, across France and arrived in Dunkirk.
"Sorry" said the nice French man, " you can't get on the Ferry, its freight and wheel traffic only, no foot passengers".
People were getting on this fucking ferry with kids tricycles, to get around this, but we were stuck, at the terminal (not many kids tricycle shops THAT close to the water) and we were no nearer to getting home.
BINGO, we call John, one of the company drivers, and he catches the NEXT ferry over, drives off, we pile in, and drives back on again.
Genius.
We get to Dover, and John, bless him, takes us home.
I love John.
I arrived home, to an angry Mrs, on the Tuesday, at 2pm, 52 hours after we set off, on three hours sleep, and almost no food.
I went to bed, and got to work on Wednesday.
The rest of our group arrived home on the Friday, having taken a slightly more scenic and genteel route home.

It was certainly something I will remember forever, but I won't ever do anything like it again, not through choice anyway.

Next time the Volcano goes off, I'm staying in bed.
(Unstable-Dan looks like that bloke out of Scream, Tue 19 Jul 2011, 12:43, 8 replies)

I like this
And clicked the appropriate button.
(CactusZack Shaved his coin purse on, Tue 19 Jul 2011, 13:51, closed)

eyethangyow
it should have been a hateful experience, but the chaps I was with made it, in so much more detail than I could go into here.
Still, fuck volcanoes. Hard.
(Unstable-Dan looks like that bloke out of Scream, Tue 19 Jul 2011, 14:02, closed)

I still have trouble pronouncing the name.
And have to copy-paste it. Fuck Eyjafjallajökull right in the arse.
(The Luggage is haunted..., Tue 19 Jul 2011, 15:19, closed)

I think only Icelanders and other Nordic types can pronounce it.
I'm told it's pronounced oiyer-fyeller-yerkuel, or similar, and means "island mountain glacier".
I blame Bjork.
(Me, I'm not... in any way intoxicated, Tue 19 Jul 2011, 17:47, closed)

Yes, you were
stupid cnuts.

But *click* all the same.
(Mork, Tue 19 Jul 2011, 15:27, closed)

thanks for clickage

(Unstable-Dan looks like that bloke out of Scream, Wed 20 Jul 2011, 13:52, closed)

Epic!
Have a click, sir.
(darras jeg har en grevling i hodet. Grevling, grevlang, Wed 20 Jul 2011, 8:40, closed)

cheers!

(Unstable-Dan looks like that bloke out of Scream, Wed 20 Jul 2011, 13:52, closed)