Layovers - Air Travel podcast

Strikes add to the travel chaos, for a summer of discontent, and Alex experiences it all first hand — are we back to the 1970s? Two hours of air travel stories to unravel it all, and more.

Brace brace brace, travel chaos ahead! Another two hours fly by between Alex and Paul, going to Medellin and back, with a million stories in between.

A Round the World conversation with our friend Mark Vanhoenacker for the launch of his new book 'Imagine a City'. We talk about our love for cities, the small ones of our birth, the big ones of our dreams, afar from the skies, and up close on the ground. Mark also tells us about moving from his beloved 747 to the 787. A conversation even a fire alarm couldn't stop.

Virgin Atlantic to the Caribbean and back, Paul is finally no longer a Virgin virgin. Flying from SLU over St Lucia in an Airbus Helicopter. The Cathay white liveries. The 777X is delayed for the 500th time. Who's flying the Air France 777?

Emirates, Emirates and more Emirates, in First, in Business, on 380s or 777s. To Male and seaplanes for Alex, to Dubai with a blank at deplaning for Paul. But also some SWISS (the savior), some BA (when it's not cancelled), the new longest route in the world (who's currently flying it??), the QR Airbus saga, Athens airport (Alex, not Paul, this time!) and more. And yes, Alitalia, because it was never going to be ITA, wasn't it?

We're back, after Alex took his time to hack a 747 seat belt sign, and Paul having played too much Airportle.

Alex tours the US, from Denver to San Francisco to Las Vegas to Oakland to Hawaii, and gets to experience his first 737MAX, and the Great Pacific (aka lyrically talking about ZOA KZAK Oakland Air Route Traffic Control Center). We discuss the state of travel in this weird era, not yet post-Covid, still pandemic-ish but not yet endemic, a weird middle where international flying is depressed, but with clearer skies ahead for some.

Alex gets cancelled (not him, the flight!). Duty free to nowhere (and no good pricing anyway). No kidnap fee, a new product by Ryanair. Plague terminal at LHR. Amber, the color of confusion. Genomics quarantine. Digital health visas (aka Covid passports, what a silly name). The travel bubble that refuses to happen. BOOM, our supersonic hopes, the PR reality. The timing of corporate travel taking off. Chicken broth cocktail (try it!).

Alex outsmarts a diversion, using all the on-air WiFi. Paul talks Scrabble (he clearly spent too much time on the ground). Flights to nowhere and airplane food to your door are not for us, even if it's BA First. 2 Boeing 2 Airbus, Pandemic Drift. ITA, Italy's Troublesome Arrangement (we've come up with a better acronym in the episode). The Singapore Airlines 380 First STEAMPUNK experience, before all the 380s disappeared.

When two friends who haven’t seen each other for a year, meet again. One didn’t travel, the other just a little. Recorded live, no edits.