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Flying to Venice for a
fiver makes one incredibly smug. In fact, it made all 246 passengers on the
fully booked Friday night flight I took incredibly smug. Regardless of the three-hour
delay, a bargain brings out the best in British travellers.
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Seeing as no one onboard had paid more than a fiver and
most had booked over the internet it wasn't so surprising that there seemed
to be no one under 30 visiting Venice that weekend.
So the delay simply meant hitting the airport bar and trying to get
comfy on a 24-litre rucksack while striking up a conversation with your neighbour.
Low-budget, no
frills air travel has changed European travel for those on a particularly
short shoestring.
Weekends in Biarritz, Milan, Prague or indeed Venice
are no longer exclusively the realm of the well-to-do. For the price of an extravagant
weekend out in London, we can now check out the art galleries in Paris
and Barcelona or the nightlife in Madrid.
Or, in weeks where companies such as Ryanair
release their 'any flight for a fiver' deal, you could do as 28 year old Michelle
Page did.
Michelle took a week's annual leave from her marketing job at MTV and for £15
took three separate flights to Venice, Madrid and Lamezia in southern Italy.
'I spent three days in each and saw far more than I ever would have during
one week in one country' she gloated.
Perhaps a tad ambitious for those simply wanting a change of scenery for a weekend,
the beauty of the budget flights is in their slightly eccentric destinations.
While encompassing most of the major destinations in Europe, companies such as
easyjet or BA subsidiary
Go can also fly you
to a few less well-known European destinations to get a taste of the country while
avoiding the crowds.
Michelle recommends the least likely of her three destinations: 'I had a great
week, but Lamezia when I visited (in early October) was still warm and quite different
from anywhere else'.
Back in Venice meanwhile, there's no escaping the crowds. With everything
as it should be the romance is rife – and in autumn the breeze carries
away some of the truly repugnant smells the city's stagnant water can produce.
The pizza's great, the beer is cheap but the accommodation outrageously
expensive.
Half an hour away from Venice by train is Padua (Padova), a university
town with 60,000 students in its 300,000 population. All the beauty of Venice
(minus the canals – a tiny factor) with better pizza, cheaper beer
and vastly cheaper accommodation. The student vibe brings with it some
of the best nights out in Europe with a friendly and vibrant bar culture.
Budget air travel, coupled with getting away from the American-orientated tourist
hot spots makes for a cheap and different weekend away. Not to mention a bit of
smugness.
— Polly Curtis, 29.11.00
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