Our flight to Corfu was very quiet and easy. Unfortunately, we landed in complete darkness at the Corfu Airport, otherwise we would certainly have experienced a visually very nice approach. I was able to watch it on a screen, a video straight from the cockpit. We really missed out on something here.
My first encounter with the airport Corfu, respectively with the sanitary facilities there, was horrific. And I am really used to a lot through working in schools!
There was a toilet area in the arrivals hall, where you also get your suitcases back. All in all, there were 7 stalls, which surely are not many for the lady’s room, but should be sufficient … If, oh, if all of them had actually been usable. In 2 of the stalls there wasn’t even a toilet bowl, in two others the toilets were out of order and covered. The cleanliness and quality of the remaining 3 toilets were catastrophic.
Tip:
Just before the landing, use the toilets in the airplane!
Our return flight was also announced for the late evening.
We were picked up at 6 pm together with other guests from our hotel who wanted to fly to Hamburg and Düsseldorf. Our flight to Berlin was scheduled for 9:15 pm. Upon arrival we were greeted by a nervous member of the TUI staff who announced that only passengers for Düsseldorf and Hamburg were to proceed to check-in. The flight to Berlin is delayed and in order not to hinder the check-in process for the other passengers we were asked to wait on the side of the airberlin check-in area with our suitcases. A look to the information screen told us: an announced delay until 10 pm.
When the check-in counters got a bit quieter, we decided to at least get rid of the luggage. So we queued and actually received our board cards. The baggage drop off turned out to be more complicated. Weighed and marked at the check-in desk, we needed to take them with us again only to bring them over to another desk. So we went over to the next long queue which was only for passengers waiting to drop off their luggage. All items from all 8 desks needed to go through one scanner before they finally disappeared on a conveyer belt towards the airplanes. By this time, a good 50 minutes had passed. Hard to imagine how this would play out with even more than three flights ready for check-in at once.
As our flight was still delayed according to the information screens, we sat down in one of the restaurants with a good view over the runways. Every now and again I eyed the ques for security checks in the departure hall, which were also very long. Obeying my warning gut feeling, we decided to go and que as well. Here, the underwhelming total of three scanners were used for all the passengers. So we waited again… Meanwhile an announcement over the speakers told all passengers with easyjet to England to “please pick the checked in luggage up again. We have buses back to the hotels waiting in front of the airport. New departure time of the flight is tomorrow, 8:45 pm.” So a flood of passengers from the other side of the gates streamed back out through security to the departure hall and had to push through the waiting people. After we finally passed all security controls it had gotten 8:30. Our flight was still scheduled for 10.
Another visit of the airport toilets, as much as the memory of my fist visit told me otherwise, had unfortunately become necessary at that time. At least these toilets were a little better and, first and foremost, cleaner.
After barely being back in the waiting area, another announcement informed all passengers to Berlin to proceed to boarding through gate number 2. It was only 8:45 and our flight was on time after all! Unfortunately, due to the still false information in the departure hall, not all passengers had passed through the security control so we had to wait for them. But he really very capable airberlin cabin crew informed the ground staff and we were able to start almost on time. We have not seen such a mess yet!
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