Which are the most popular destinations for flights and passengers between today and Easter Monday? I asked the aviation analysts, Cirium, to crunch the numbers. It turns out that each Easter (and, for that matter, Christmas and any other bank holiday) one destination towers above the others for passengers from UK airports. Paris? Barcelona? New York? Not even close: that triumvirate of French, Spanish and US metropolitan allure occupies the relegation zone of the top 12 Easter destinations. Top place always goes to Dublin. Of the 70,000 passengers heading for the Irish capital between now and Easter Monday, a good few will be actual holidaymakers. They will discover Ireland has an abundance of indulgence, plus some of the friendliest people on the planet. But many of the passengers arriving in Dublin for Easter aboard hundreds of flights from Great Britain are Irish citizens working in the UK and going home. Comfortably ahead of the rest of the field of "proper" tourist destinations is Amsterdam. More British travellers will fly there this weekend than to Copenhagen, Lisbon and Rome combined. The Dutch capital has cornered the market in much of the world's greatest art and, as my credit card will testify, many superb places to eat and drink. Many of those 60,000 outbound passengers from the UK will fly on the Dutch airline KLM, connecting at Schiphol airport to other destinations across Europe and the world. Amsterdam has far better links to regional UK airports than Heathrow or Gatwick. Paris can offer all those virtues, yet the French capital has only half the passenger traffic. So what is the Dutch difference? Schiphol is the gateway to much more than Amsterdam. Four outstanding cities – Leiden, the Hague, Rotterdam and Utrecht – are within an hour's train journey from the airport. Add in the fine towns of Haarlem, Gouda and Delft, and you can understand the Easter appeal of a boarding pass to AMS. The full top 30 Easter destinations from UK airports |
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This could be Rotterdam, or anywhere |
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| With grassy dunes, uninterrupted sands and charming seaside towns, these are the spots to book. Read more. |
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| From temples to taramasalata and sandy beaches to scenery, Greece is best seen by water. Read more. |
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Time to bin the boarding pass: your face could soon be your ticket to fly. The technology firm Amadeus and the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) believe you will soon be gliding through every airport using facial recognition alone. You will receive a so-called "journey pass" at the moment of booking. The pass will be stored on your phone and can be updated automatically. In the event of a repeat of the Heathrow fiasco on 21 March, when more than a quarter-million passengers had their flights cancelled after a power failure, your journey pass will be updated with a replacement departure. All being well, though, you should not even have to show the pass to cross each airport hurdle. Airport and airline tech will converge with each other and your passport – which will, by then, be a digital document. The cameras will clock you as soon as you walk in to the airport. A massive database has been expecting you. Simply smile your way through security, duty-free and the departure gate. Actually, don't smile: given the foibles of facial recognition, a frown will probably get you further faster in an airport, if not in life. What could possibly go wrong? Well, as you may have noticed, technology is not infallible. Many passengers feel more comfortable printing out a copy of the boarding pass rather than relying on their smartphone keeping its charge. But as Covid travel restrictions showed, aviation and governmental processes are increasingly digital only. Top tech journalist Kate Bevan joined me for yesterday's travel podcast and talked through the many moral and logistical concerns of a seamless, digital airport experience.
For now, though, hope for the best but be prepared for delays and disruption, whatever form of transport you choose. I am writing to you in the early hours of Friday from Thursday's 7.35pm GWR train from Exeter to London. We were due at London Paddington three hours ago, but have yet to reach Didcot Parkway. It could be a long Easter.
All the UK Easter transport chaos I know about at 7am on Friday |
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Each week, we'll ask you to choose between two destinations in our exclusive Travel Week poll. This Friday, it's a choice between a beach break at home or jetting off for an exotic long-haul holiday.
Last week's results were emphatic, with 85 per cent opting for Costa Rica over it's lesser known neighbour Panama. Don't forget to check back next Friday for the results! |
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Les cheminots – French railway workers – are unhappy. Train conductors and drivers are threatening to strike over a range of issues, including pay, conditions and rosters. Walk-outs involving members of the Sud Rail and CGT-Cheminots unions look set to begin on 5 May and continue to 11 May. They could continue intermittently through to June. What could it mean for your journey? Typically Eurostar trains between London and Paris are unaffected. Onward connections usually are. The Paris RER suburban rail network is likely to run a half-decent service. A fair number of long-distance TGV trains will operate, but the problem is that confirmed reservations are required for each passenger. If your departure is cancelled, you may not be able to get on the next one. But links to and from Eurostar trains have some protection from the HOTNAT ("hop on the next available train") agreement between high-speed rail operators. |
Glasgow airport is not about to close |
One of the strangest stories this week: a prediction that Glasgow airport, the second-busiest in Scotland after Edinburgh, will close down within a couple of decades once high-speed rail arrives. Where to start on this? Well, no one would be more delighted than me for high-speed rail to connect London with Glasgow and Edinburgh. But the idea that the catastrophically mismanaged HS2 will reach even as far north as Manchester and Leeds by 2040 looks fanciful. The current government has endorsed the last administration's hatchet job on high-speed lines beyond Birmingham. In addition, ministers are maintaining the tax incentive to fly between Scotland and London rather than travel by train. Glasgow is a perfectly good medium-sized airport with a big catchment area, including southwest and northwest Scotland, and is the main hub for flights to the Western Isles. If you want to shine a spotlight on a Scottish airport for possible closure, it must be Prestwick – one of the UK's ghost airports. Passenger numbers at the Ayrshire airport last year were 535,000 – just one-15th of those at Glasgow, and one-fifth of the terminal's capacity. But the Scottish government is keen to keep Prestwick open, so public cash will continue to be pumped in to support the airport and subsidise its 1,500 daily passengers. How Birmingham airport aims to be a London hub (podcast) |
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I am going to the Greek island of Rhodes for the first time this spring. I am staying in an all-inclusive property on the west coast, but if I can drag myself away where do you recommend for a day trip or two? |
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Your timing is excellent. You will be visiting one of my favourite Greek islands without the searing summer temperatures. Try to make two key day trips – though, if you don't mind a long day, you could squeeze both locations into a single journey. The first is Rhodes Town, at the far northeastern tip of the island. The capital has an extraordinary depth of history wrapped inside the intensely atmospheric walled Old Town. The New Town, dotted with Art Deco buildings from the Italian era, is also attractive. The top cultural collection is the Archaeological Museum of Rhodes, housed in the Hospital of the Knights – one of the Crusader complexes that transformed the city. Wander across the port where the Colossus of Rhodes once stood astride the entrance. Next is Lindos, halfway down the eastern shore. Perched high on a cliff, presiding over the port is the archaeological highlight of Rhodes: the Acropolis. Beneath it, you will find a 14th-century Crusader castle, and close to sea level there is a tranquil village of twisting, narrow lanes – which include some excellent places to eat and drink. Between Lindos and Rhodes Town, incidentally, Kalithea Springs is a fascinating Italian-built spa complex. One more option that could make a half-day outing. At the southwestern tip of Rhodes is Prasonisi. It is connected to the village of Macheria on the mainland by an isthmus in the form of a narrow beach. At low tide, Prasonisi is a peninsula, and at high tide it becomes an island. The Aegean (to the west) and the Mediterranean (to the east) meet at this beach. Prasonisi is well worth exploring if you are up for a hike. |
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