Despite what is written below, and in some of the posts to follow, I enjoyed my holiday. But it's always worth recording the things that go wrong, some of which will be included in a letter to Airtours...
Minor grumbles on the outbound flight. In retrospect it was an idiotic decision to decide to fly for 10 and a half hours with a charter airline. But it's cheap, and you get what you pay for. But when you book a holiday you don't really contemplate what a ten hour flight means, and to the extent to which you do, you simply accept it as a minor inconvenience to get you to your dream destination. And actually, the outbound flight really wasn't so bad, with the expectation of arriving to ease the discomfort. Up to a point...
The in-flight entertainment was shit. Even so, I purchased a set of headphones, but then realised that they only worked in one ear, and half of what they were advertising in the magazine wasn't even available, so I demanded my money back. The meals were of paltry portions. What miffed me most was that they run this patronising video telling you how to avoid DVT (ie to cover their backs) which includes instructions to drink plenty of water. And so they charged £1 for each bottle of water - measuring a whole 330 ml. I know it's a charter flight, and it's cheap, and I don't really object to them charging exorbitant prices for the alcohol and tacky souvenirs, or even for soft drinks, but I'm contemplating the Health and Safety Executive. I discovered on the way back that you could get tap water if you asked for it, and perhaps I wouldn't mind paying a pound for a litre bottle, but for a third of a litre - that's an insult.
The cabin crew had a total attitude problem, but then - what a crap job - basically being a glorified tea lady who gets to wipe up people's vomit, whilst suffering the physical discomforts of life in a pressurised cabin. Nice...
When we arrived at our hotel, our immediate impression was that it was a shithole, and we wanted to get out as soon as possible. Of course, we should have realised that our judgement was somewhat affected by a long journey and no sleep, and we soon grew to tolerate most aspects of the shithole. Indeed some aspects were positively good - the standard of food in particular, although, apart from snacks and the Gala dinners we only ate their once.
We had originally booked into a different hotel, which was supposed to be 50m from the beach, but were transferred to this one, supposedly equivalent, and next door. Just a few days before we departed we were informed that it was in fact 1.5 km from the beach. Our original hotel was described as 'suitable for couples and older people' and we requested a quiet room - that was noted in the hotel register. A quiet room seemed to consist of being between the kitchen and the maintenance block so we woken up every morning at seven o'clock by the sound of the staff. It also consisted of being put in a block with four of a group of 8 (all male) lager louts, who every night returned at about 4 am shouting loudly, messing around in the Pool area, slamming doors, having their tarts hold loud conversations on the stairs, banging on our bedroom doors, and smashing the bolts on their doors. In the first week, as a result of complaints from almost all the other residents, they received a verbal (sic) warning, then a written warning, yet they continued their mayhem throughout the second week. I did not get one undisturbed night - despite using earplugs for the first time in my life. In comparison, the lack of air-conditioning, the toilet seat affixed upside down (studs in your bum...) the electrical fixings hanging off the wall, the mothballs stinking out the (tiny) wardrobe, drawer and bedside cabinet, and the sheets that didn't quite fit the beds pale into insignificance - after all it's a three star hotel in India, what was I expecting? And anyway, we just used the hotel as a base to sleep. What a joke...
