I'll get you Butler.

Sherrers wrote:Here goes...

So we were what? 3 of us? Been up at St Anton in the Austrian Alps on a very large one. 2 weeks of hard skiing and even harder boozing.

We were flying home on a Friday evening to arrive back in London for both of us having gigs all weekend. Back when we worked every Fri/Sat. In fact we had to cancel just to get the time off to go away. I mention this as it was unusually important that we got back and did the gigs. I am 99% sure the Friday night gig for Jon had been moved there to allow for our skiing. You don't miss any gigs but if you miss one that has been re-sheduled you will never work for that person again more than likely.

Naturally we were still boozing at about 8am the Friday morning. I can't remember if there was sleep? Jon you will have to correct any errors.

So instead of our sleeping host the keys to his brand new audi (a4 estate? it was nice) were given to one of the YTS kids to drive us to our scheduled flight from Friedrichshafen. That's Germany sorry if that is known. It's not that far though. I think the flight was about 5pm. The drive is about 90 mins (driving fast) just over the border in Germany. So we set off about Midday. Still jolly and boozing in the car I think. We were jollying along some lovely scenery and suddenly we go to the turning onto the huge tunnel (I think it's one of the world's biggest) that cuts down through the alps into the foothills and we see a queue and cars abandoned.

Doesn't really register anything is wrong but I do get a niggling feeling. This isn't England where people get helicoptered off an inch of sleet and the nation grinds to a halt. It's Austria. Snow tyres and chains compulsory. Their driving test is military grade. The snow isn't any deeper than usual….

The we get on the autobahn and see miles down sloping down before the tunnel and it is proper gridlocked. Realised then the abandoned cars were people bailing out of the queue not the weather.

Now in Europe at most airports they are pretty easy about check-in compared to the twits in England. As long as you can reasonably get to the plane. And we were seasoned travellers (very seasoned ) and had hand luggage only (i go to my mate's over there so often all my ski gear is already in St Anton). So feasibly by the point we get stuck we have about 3 hours to make about a 40 min drive. When I say the traffic crawled I mean it was so slow you turned the the engine off. People had pulled over and had little camp fires out. Long story short we got a few miles from the airport in Germany and the clock struck 5. All the time I was phoning our host and agents etc to set up options. So we turned around to try get to…

Zurich. Which isn't far really. About as far again. We discovered the reason for the trouble at the tunnel. Biggest pile up in it's History. Also we found that up in the alps it was alright but down the mountain's foothills it was fierce blizzards. I think this Zurich flight was just before 7and I think the gate shut at 6.30

Also bear in mind we are buying tickets over the phone. Being the dashing hero of the take I have to say I did call it. I said we'd miss Zurich and should head to Geneva where a 4 and a half hour drive would get us there for a 10pm flight. We agreed to go for both (and buy tickets for both ) and lo! we passed the turning off the autobahn for Zurich airport at 6.30.

3 hours give or take to Geneva AND finally no traffic. Brand new A4, no speed limit, spunky young nutbag at the wheel… averaging about 140 mph…

So got to about 9ish and young YTS lad who has not even had a piss since about 11.30am is stoutly flying along and I'm learning the words to the lighthouse keeper tune and literally it's suddenly one of those properly magic moments when I must have seen it in my peripheral vision but he was about 20 yards from driving straight into a concrete divide at over 100mph and I actually grabbed the wheel although he recovered it. We stopped to let him have a shake and shit himself and it started to blizzard. Clear tarmac on way into petrol station. Couple of centimetres on way out. We arrived at Geneva airport, YTS drove off. First person we saw said the weather had closed in too quick and our flight was severely delayed at the other end. Couldn't say if it would fly that night.

Called YTS lad back (he was overjoyed). Found an EasyJet out of Basel. Called the gigs in UK and shifted the sets to later. Basel Easyjet flies at 1am-ish. It is officially the ONLY AND LAST FLIGHT from that region to London. It's before 10pm and the journey is roughly… YES! BINGO 3 hours. On the plus side it was by far the cheapest one yet.

Off went the Marie Celeste, it's doomed crew reduced to groaning and hungover to fuck. Couldn't stop for anything once fuelled up. I'll draw this epic norse tale to the close by saying we ...

GOT THERE… YAY .

Actual american style whooping and such. Got to the Easyjet desk and explained to the smiling lady that as Basel airport is actually in France (just) and we'd also brushed Liechtenstein we'd been therefore been over 13 hours and 5 countries to get there this very day!! you know the hideous pile up blocking the tunnel?? we were there! you know the blizzards? we beat them THANK YOU JEEZIS! yes Lord…and maybe that was some kind of record but it was nice to hear an English voice… forgive our enthusiasm ma'am...

"Oh no you can't get on this flight. There's a bus you see and the last one has gone"

Yes but The flight is 01.15am. Gate shuts at 12.45. IT'S 12.30!! we made it!

"No you see the check-in is closed"

Triumph. That's good! Great! 'cos we have no bags to check in. And we've already been checked in online back in Austria. You see it is unusually important we get on this plane...

"You're not getting on this flight sadly. I have to go now…"

At this point Carter, who is the mildest of chaps just lost it. Cartoon steam out of ears shouting at the top of his voice lost it. Started thrashing her desk with his bag like John Cleese attacking a car with a small tree.

Armed security arrived etc etc Carter is dragged away shouting death threats at the long gone woman...

Sherrers wrote:Yeah. The what? Postscript? Happy ending?

I used to DJ in Basel a lot, rang the promoters after the five-nation-spanning 13 hours of hell and said we'd been shafted by Easyjet.

They came to collect us, took us to the club's restaurant and gave us an amazing meal and got us a stupidly cheap rate at the Hilton and even booked the flights the next morning for us.

Got to love the Swiss.

Sherrers wrote:snow nazis