Scotland - The Last Day

All good vacations must come to an end and our visit to Scotland was no different.  On our last day we packed up and drove to the Edinburgh airport.  Let me offer you some advice based on our experience flying home from Scotland.  Give yourself plenty of time at the airport!  This isn't new news, but I'm not sure what I was thinking when I booked the flight.  Actually, I know what I was thinking and it was incorrect thinking!  On the way home we flew from Edinburgh to London to the United States.  For some reason I was thinking we'd go through customs in Edinburgh and as long as we got to the Edinburgh airport early, we'd be fine.  It didn't click to me until we were already in Scotland that Edinburgh to London is NOT an international flight.  It's a domestic flight!  London to the United States was the international leg of the journey.

We had a two hour layover in London and we made our London flight, but it was far too close for comfort.  First, our flight from Edinburgh was delayed 15 minutes.  Second, while en route to London we were told not to get up and exit the plane right away as room was needed for emergency medical personnel to enter the plane.  Someone on the plane was having a medical emergency.  This probably bought us time.  Although we had to wait 5-10 minutes to leave the plane, when the plane touched down in London we immediately taxied to a gate very quickly.  Under normal landing procedures, the taxing would probably have taken longer.  I'm still leaving this in my story to make it sound better.  :-)  Then I swear our plane parked at the end of the airport farthest from where we needed to go.  Then we needed to transfer terminals (a 15 minute bus ride).  Then more walking.  We were walking briskly and sweating by the time we arrived at the London gate.

Thankfully we did not have to go through customs in London.  When returning from Ireland two years ago, we went through customs in Dublin before departing.  On that trip it took us 3 hours to get from the front doors of the airport to our gate.  Ug.  If customs in London was necessary, we would have missed our flight.  Yikes!

My point is this.  Give yourself more than a 2 hour layover when flying internationally.  Maybe it will work, but I'd much rather have too much time than too little time.  If there's too much time, I always have a book or magazine to read.