A mother and son who were stranded in Alicante by Monarch have finally made it back to Britain via Barcelona, Majorca and Toulouse after a disastrous 58-hour journey.
Tom Payne, from London, decided to treat his mother Sharon Morris to a trip to Spain after her husband was recently given the all-clear from cancer.
But the sun-soaking quickly turned hellish after the cancellation of their flight home resulted in spending more almost three days in various airports desperately trying to get to the UK.
And having arrived in London at 1am today having arrived at the airport in Alicante first thing Tuesday morning, it didn’t get any better for Mrs Morris, who spent another 18 hours trying to get from the capital to her home in Bristol after the train she was on unexpectedly terminated in Swindon.
Tom Payne (left), from London, decided to treat his mother Sharon Morris (right) to a trip to Spain after her husband was recently given the all-clear from cancer
Tom Payne uploaded this picture of himself late on Thursday night having hopped on his final flight – from Toulouse to Luton
After a night’s sleep in his own bed, Mr Payne, 24, said: ‘I’m still exhausted by the whole thing. It was a palaver, an absolute shambles.
‘Everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong and you just could not make it up – it was like a comedy.
‘It got so bad I considered swimming a couple of times.’
Their flight from Alicante to Luton with Monarch was scheduled for 8am on Tuesday and when it was cancelled the pair scrambled to book an alternative trip home.
Through Ryanair, they booked a replacement which was due to fly out at 10am, but that too got cancelled, putting them further out of pocket.
Third time was not the charm for the mother and son, because when the mother and son paid for tickets home via Milan, both the trip from Spain to Italy and the journey from Italy to the UK were cancelled by airline Vueling, meaning a night in the airport.
After spending Tuesday in Alicante, they managed to board an Air Europa flight to Majorca.
The plan was to fly to the Spanish island, catch another flight to Toulouse and then get on their final plane back to Britain.
In another calamitous twist, the Air Europa flight was delayed by 40 minutes, meaning they missed the connecting journey to Barcelona, leaving them stranded in Palma, Majorca on Wednesday night.
Tom and his mother got back to the drawing board and plotted yet another complex trip home.
This meant travelling to Barcelona with Air Europa, from Barcelona to Toulouse with Vueling and then from Toulouse to Luton on an Easyjet flight.
After another night’s sleep at a different Spanish airport, the unlucky travellers finally left Majorca at 1.30pm Thursday and got on the complicated, 12-hour succession of flights home to London.
The nightmare trip ended up adding more than £600 to their holiday bill.
Mr Payne claimed his mother kept adding to their misfortune by jinxing their trip home.
‘Everything she said, happened,’ he said.
‘She would say, “Imagine if this flight is cancelled”, and then just like that it was cancelled.
‘We woke up Tuesday saying nothing could go wrong, and it did. We did the same Wednesday and it just got worse.
‘And then to top it all off, the train stopped in Swindon and I told her, “Mum, you’ve got to shut up now”. It was just ridiculous.’
Mrs Morris’ journey went from bad to worse when she headed west on a train from London.
It unexpectedly stopped in Swindon due to technical issues, meaning she only got home at 6pm today.
But Mr Payne, who works as a maître d at a restaurant in North London, took it all in his stride.
He said: ‘We had to take it in good humour.
‘We had two choices – sit there and cry or take it for what it is and laugh.
‘We couldn’t shout at anyone because what was it going to achieve?
‘It was laugh or cry and we decided to laugh.’
The pair kept family and friends up to date with hilarious updates on Facebook.
They decided to have a beer in each airport they visited and Mr Payne estimated he and his mother sprayed around 50 different bottles of perfume at the various duty free shops.
It was meant to be a trip away for Mrs Morris as a treat after the family received the good news that Tom’s step-father Wayne Morris had been given the all clear from cancer in his tonsils and lymph nodes.
Mrs Morris had been caring for her husband, and the family decided when he was well enough to get back to work and look after himself independently, Sharon and Tom would take a short break.
She had not missed an appointment with her husband, but the massive delay meant she was unable to attend the doctors with him.
‘She was devastated she missed it,’ her son said.
‘But it was quality time for us. With me in London and her Bristol – we made the most out of it because we don’t see each other much.’
Unsurprisingly, neither will be rushing back to book a flight with Monarch or Ryanair.
Mr Payne said: ‘Monarch are done now, but hopefully they’ll never come back.
‘And with Ryanair, we flew with them on the way out and I turned to my mum and said, “I would never fly on a plane like this again”.
‘As it turned out – I didn’t.’