Bill's Comment Page

Year of 'jinxed' holidays

I discovered yesterday afternoon that my planned vacation (to northern Tenerife) beginning next Monday is not now to be. The parent company of the travel firm I booked with has gone bust. My money is (touch wood) ATOL protected. I could have rebooked the same holiday immediately, but would have had to pay again. The refund from ATOL apparently takes about two or three weeks to appear, so I prefer to wait until this is safely achieved before committing more funds to this company; call me cynical or at the very least just careful. I've already cancelled hotel bookings in London before and after this holiday, but unfortunately I cannot do anything about a refund on the flights to and from London on EasyJet; the holiday would have commenced from and ended at Gatwick. So I'll just have to write that off, but luckily it's not a huge amount.

A holiday earlier this year, in March, also came to nought - it was to have been a week at a self-catering lodge on the west coast of Scotland. The lodge offered when I arrived was considerably different (and smaller) than I had booked and paid for, so I didin't go through with it.

On the positive side, today being 1st October, I can now walk on the beach here again with my dog; from April to September the part closest to where I live (i.e. less than 100 metres) is off-limits to dogs because it is a popular bathing beach in the summer. I have to go about a mile to the east or half a mile to the west to get onto the beach in summer with my dog - hardly a crushing blow, but in the winter it's just that little bit more convenient. And today was a glorious sunny autumn day and the sea was almost mirror smooth.