[LuganoPirate]

I was inspired to start this thread by GivingupBA and his story of a hat being passed round to help pay for fuel on an Afghan Airlines flight. I have a feeling this was one of those stories as I’d heard it before since it happened to a friend of a friend, and I thought it would be interesting (and amusing) to hear what other stories like this we’ve come across on our travels.

The two that come to my mind just now are:
The American couple who went to a restaurant in Hong Kong with their small dog and where no-one spoke English. They indicated to the waiter that their dog should be fed who took the dog away to be, as they thought fed. Of course the dog came back cooked on a platter. This has happened to at least three friends of mine!

The other is where a female traveler befriends a small stray dog in South America. She smuggles it back to Europe and takes it to the vet for vaccinations and to find out its breed, only to be told by the vet it was in fact a giant rat!!!

Any others anyone?

[seasonedtraveller]

It’s rather like the story about the elderly American lady who enthused at the beauty of Windsor Castle then allegedly asked “Why ever did they build it on the flightpath to Heathrow”?

Urban legend?

[Charles-P]

I have always enjoyed the following, told to me by people on three different continents.

The airline safety guidelines telling passengers in an emergency to put their heads down are because that ensures necks are broken resulting in no injured passengers making claims on the airline afterwards.

There is one story however that I had heard on a number of occasions and always assumed to be false until I saw evidence that it was in fact perfectly true. Giant concrete arrows for guiding early pilots.

(courtesy of Snopes)
Every so often, usually in the vast deserts of the American Southwest, a hiker or a backpacker will run across something puzzling: a large concrete arrow, as much as seventy feet in length, sitting in the middle of scrub-covered nowhere.

What are these giant arrows? Some kind of surveying mark? Landing beacons for flying saucers? Earth’s turn signals?

No, it’s… The Transcontinental Air Mail Route.

On August 20, 1920, the United States opened its first coast-to-coast airmail delivery route, just 60 years after the Pony Express closed up shop.

There were no good aviation charts in those days, so pilots had to eyeball their way across the country using landmarks. This meant that flying in bad weather was difficult, and night flying was just about impossible.

The Postal Service solved the problem with the world’s first ground-based civilian navigation system: a series of lit beacons that would extend from New York to San Francisco.

Every ten miles, pilots would pass a bright yellow concrete arrow. Each arrow would be surmounted by a 51-foot steel tower & lit by a million-candlepower rotating beacon. (generator shed at the tail of each arrow powered the beacon.)

Now mail could get from the Atlantic to the Pacific not in a matter of weeks, but in just 30 hours or so.

Even the dumbest of air mail pilots, it seems, could follow a series of bright yellow arrows straight out of a Tex Avery cartoon. By 1924, just a year after Congress funded it, the line of giant concrete markers stretched from Rock Springs, Wyoming to Cleveland, Ohio. The next summer, it reached all the way to New York, and by 1929 it spanned the continent uninterrupted, the envy of postal systems worldwide.

Radio and radar are, of course, infinitely less cool than a concrete Yellow Brick Road from sea to shining sea, but I think we all know how this story ends. New advances in communication and navigation technology made the big arrows obsolete, and the Commerce Department decommissioned the beacons in the 1940s. The steel towers were torn down and went to the war effort. But the hundreds of arrows remain. Their yellow paint is gone, their concrete cracks a little more with every winter frost, and no one crosses their path much, except for coyotes and tumbleweeds. But they’re still out there.

[canucklad]

Similar stories…..

American tourist marvelling that they built the castle in the city centre of Edinburgh.
American tourists being conned into Haggis hunts

Apparently true…
My copper mate on his beat on George Street, edinburgh intervened when he came across an American couple arguing about view……..Wife insisting that the land they could see wasn’t France, husband insisting it was indeed France on the other side of the sea.
Copper mate confirms that the brash, loud mouthed stetson wearing husband was indeed correct. France is now officially on the other side of the Forth !

Totally true
My mate and his wife having dinner in Malta. He orders a chicken pizza,……pizza arrives and he points out to the waiter that he had in actual fact ordered a Chicken Pizza .
Waiter profuselyapologies , removes the chickenless pizza and arrives 10 minutes later, with the same pizza, with a fully roasted bird perched precariously on top.

[Poshgirl58]

There have been two reported instances of the hat being passed around. In 2011 a Comtel flight from Amritsar to BHX had to make a refuelling stop. As the travel agent hadn’t paid the airline, the pilot announced it wasn’t going any further until the passengers paid for more fuel. Then in 2012 an Air France flight scheduled to land in Beirut had to divert to Damascus. Apparently the Captain explained that the Syrians wanted payment upfront for their fuel so he went cap in hand to the first class passengers. Raised 17,000 (report didn’t say which currency), but commonsense prevailed and passengers given their money back.

Director from a well-known tyre company visiting factory in Lagos. Asks his host (ex-pat Director) where he can get some cigarettes. Host calls in his driver and driver is given three brand names, with the instruction that if he can’t get those to bring something else. Driver returns with a meat pie.

[GivingupBA]

LuganoPirate, thanks, finally I inspired someone! And I like this thread. And I really enjoyed Poshgirl58’s two stories of a hat being passed around for fuel – however, the best for me was at the factory in Lagos where the “Driver returns with a meat pie”, honestly made my day.

[GivingupBA]

Oh and PS, I forgot to add – my favourite true story from the air is the Korean Air “nut rage” story.

[esselle]

Admiring the views from the champagne bar at Tower 42 in London, my American guests commented, firstly, that the roads beneath were quite windey, presumably as they had to thread around the buildings, and secondly that they could see the Eiffel Tower which they did not realise was so close to London. I did not have the heart to tell them it was the radio beacon at Crystal Palace.

[canucklad]

Whilst riding the London Eye with my travelling companions, I pointed over to the Gherkin and confidentently stated how clever it was of the Durex company to choose that particular design of building to be their headquarters.

I made sure my voice was at a level, that a group of visiting American tourists could overhear me.

They were still amused and guffawing like adolescents when they disembarked. , chatting amongst themselves how appropriate the shape was !!

[icenspice]

My mum goes out for the day with her best friend and stop at a country pub in the middle of nowhere not far from where my dad lives.

The best friend asks for a glass of red wine, Chilean if possible.

‘There you go, sorry it hasn’t been cooled’ ?

[Poshgirl58]

GivingupBA – it still makes me smile over 20 years since I first heard it!

I’m treading carefully with next story in case anyone knows the person involved. A neighbour, who belongs to one of the two main “first aid” charities, recently had her car keyed. Whilst deciding whether to get it repaired, said neighbour has applied a well-known petroleum jelly to the “scar”.

[Charles-P]

canucklad – I very much like the ‘Gherkin’ story. My former driver in the UK was for many years a London Black Cab driver and he told me about a game that cabbies would sometimes play with tourists trying to convince them regarding the sights. From memory some were:

The Thames runs dry at night
Big Ben is being replaced with a digital clock face next year
The Queen uses the Thames to commute home to Windsor Castle every morning and evening in a Royal Navy ship
The Channel Tunnel is going to be joined by a cross Channel bridge soon
James Bond is a real person and really does work at the Mi6 ‘wedding cake’ building on the Thames
Elephant and Castle has a safari park and a medieval castle.
Barclays Bank will pay a £100 reward if you return one of their bikes to one of their branches.
When on the London Underground it’s customary to introduce yourself to the people sitting next to and opposite you

[FaroFlyer]

Nice one LP

A couple that have happened to me, both involving phones:

In the early 80’s I was flying back from Milan to Birmingham on Birmingham European. As we approached BHX the Captain told us that snow had closed Birmingham airport but Coventry could accept us. This came as a bit of a surprise to us passengers but.. Anyway we landed safely, but the snow was so deep the Captain could not see the taxiway lights. A tractor came out and guided us in and we disembarked. The tractor driver, who had opened the terminal door told us that we would have to wait until the immigration / customs officer came back from home, where he had gone for his tea. The captain asked where there was a phone box so that he could phone head office to tell them where their plane was. Tractor driver told him that there is only 1 phone box and it is after immigration but, until the officer returned from his tea, nobody could move. After a little discussion 5 of us passengers offered to stand as “security” that the Captain was not going to do a runner, and we handed our passports to the tractor driver. Captain made phone call; Customs guy finished his tea and we all were released.

The second incident was on Virgin, back from HKG in the early 90’s. Bad weather closed Heathrow so we were diverted to Gatwick to await LHR re-opening. I was in the front row and asked if I could use my phone to call my wife to say where I was, and that I would be late. Chief Purser said no as we were not at the terminal and phones are not allowed. About 10 minutes later she came sheepishly back to me and asked if the Captain could borrow my phone to call head office and tell them where he is, as they could not get through by radio. Naturally I obliged, and I was then allowed to phone my wife.

[Poshgirl58]

FaroFlyer – great ones!

BHX story reminds me of sitting on Britannia 757 at EMA waiting for new clearance to Kefalonia. Delay would be about 45 minutes so IFE was put on and started with Jasper Carrott’s show. One of his topics was air travel and he asked his audience if anyone had flown from EMA and noticed the cattle grids at end of runway. Caused much amusement with passengers and crew!

Coventry has a chequered history with passenger flights. Air Corbiere used to fly to Jersey via Gloucester and Guernsey using J31 or similar. First Officer acted as Cabin Crew and was very adept at doing safety demo in a confined space. The food and drink run consisted of him opening a cool box, giving a brief description of the contents then asking passengers to make their selection and slide it down the aisle. Hope no-one from BA reads this……

[LuganoPirate]

When iwas a young boy I used to be able to see the Crystal Palace tower from my bedroom, and for many years I really thought it was the Eifel Tower!!!

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