On the way to Lisbon - NOT!

So today is the day we plan to travel to Lisbon, I say plan, as it didn't work out that way!

I outlined in yesterday's post why we are going to Lisbon, but with the race on Sunday we plan to spend a few days enjoying the life of Portugal's Capital City.

Morning

We had completed packing last night, so with the addition of the electric toothbrushes we were ready for the off.

 

We got up at 4.30am and had breakfast, more snow has fallen overnight, but here in Tongwynlais it is largely slush (at least on the roads).

We left the house at 6am watching the Stagecoach app, which said the bus had left Porth, so our fear that the bus would get stuck in the Rhondda proved unfounded.

Into Cardiff

The Bus arrived in Tongwynlais at 6:30am fifteen minutes late, but we are at least an hour early, so that slight delay is no problem.

  

We arrived at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama at 6.50am and walked across Bute Park while the snowing is looking good - i.e. a light splattering. 

We walked over the Taff Bridge and arrived at the National Express Coach Station at 7.05am for the 7.50am Coach.  

The Coach arrived five minutes late, but with the EasyJet app showing flight delays due to the airport being closed due to the snow and ice a little delay wasn't going to matter.  

Bristol Airport

On arrival at Bristol Airport at 9.40am it was apparent that the first flights of the day have not yet begun to take off.   

We were queued in the airport concourse until 10.30am when bag drop opened for our flight. With our Easyjet app this process was simple and we had completed the process by 10.50am. 

We made our way through to the boarding area and found some seats, which came to be a place we would sit for almost five hours.

We had lunch at the Starbucks in the airport Five Cheese Toastie for Drew and a Mozzarella and Tomato Panini for me. 

We made good use of the charging facilities under our chairs to make sure our phones were fully charged. The Easyjet app kept promising that our flight would go, but the time of departure kept getting pushed further back every hour. Finally, at 4.30 the message that the flight was cancelled came. We then were called to collect our luggage and travel from airside, to the main part of the airport. This was a little madcap as so many people were facing the same expereince and the airport logistics were clearly designed for getting people in to, rather than out of, the airside waiting areas. 

Still being routed through the airport gave us time (thanks to the magic of mobile phone internet access) to look for alternative flights. We looked to book on Easyjet flights for the next few days, but they were all already fully booked, so we looked at alternatives either to fly to Lisbon or to fly to Faro and train down to Lisbon. 

It was a big relief, twenty minutes later, to find a RyanAir flight to Lisbon on Friday (i.e. two days time) at 9.40am from Stansted Airport. This worked well as it gave us a chance to have a leisurely day on Thursday travelling from Bristol to Stansted! 

Into Bristol

With our bags we went back to the Airport Bus Station and got a bus to Bristol, meanwhile we booked accommodation for tonight in a Bristol Premier Inn and tomorrow night in one at Stanstead. 

The Airport Bus took us to the Bristol Bus Station, a few hundred yards from our hotel - The Premier Inn, Haymarket. We went into our room refreshed ourselves and it was time to look for somewhere to eat. 

It is a standard Premier Inn room, but nice and comfy, and before anyone asks, of course Captain Jack came with us too.

Dinner in Bristol

Wednesday is busier on a Wednesday evening than I might have expected. We walked around, tried a number of restaurants which were full and then came across Sergio's Restaurant, an old Bristol favourite that I'd last visited almost 40 years ago.

Sergio's is an old school Italian, but its food is delicious. So, while the day had been disappointing, in that we should have been eating in Lisbon by now, but the quality of the food made up for the disappointment - a nice end to a challenging day.

For starters Drew opted for Beef carpaccio, an old favourite of his, and one which he says was done very well here. 

I opted for Penne Arrabiata with Parmesan which had a good chilli kick and el dente pasta, perfect to make me feel calm and comfortable after a challanging day.

Drew choose to have pasta as a main, he's not as greedy as me!. His choice, a Penne Amatriciana, which was perfect for him. He ate every bit of it.

My main was an old Tuscan favourite, Cacciucco, that is a fish stew with sea bass, salmon, clams, mussels, artichoke and sweet peppers in a light tomato sauce. It is cooked so that the flavours of the fish merge into the sauce - originally a peasant dish designed to use up fish that wasn't good enough to shell, when served like this, it is a real delicacy and always puts me in mind of an American favourite of mine, cioppino, which, cooked in a similar way, is famed in San Francisco. The cacciucco was served with vegetables on the side, and apart from the shells of the shell fish, every bit was wiped up by the toasted homemade bread. Delicious. 

For dessert Drew opted for Jaffa Chocolate Mountain Cake, he really loved the Jaffa Cake flavour of this dessert.

I enjoyed a lovely Italian Cheese Platter with two soft cheeses and two hard cheeses, each getting tangier than the one before. I managed to clear this plate too! It has clearly been a hungry day!

No Italian meal is complete without an espresso, so we washed our food down with one each.

We walked back, though another snow flurry, to the Premier Inn and were in bed by 9.30pm, ready to sleep and discover for whatever excitement tomorrow will bring!