Isn’t Technology Brilliant?

This past two weeks Mr Kandys sister and his brother in law have been over in Canada experienceing the country on the Rocky Mountaineer train and are travelling home today.

What I find fascinating is that I can tap into Google the flight numbers and it takes me to the Air Canada website and I can see a little computerised map showing me the route,time of departure/arrival at Heathrow airport,air speed, height at which they are flying how long they have been in the air how long they taxied on the runway befor they left and how many minutes they will taxi on the runway when they land etc and at the moment they should be asleep as they cross the bottom of Greenland and on towards the daylight of the U.K.

I know you can get Apps for the phones which track the flights of aircraft as my niece had one when her fiancé piloted planes and she could see where he was in the world

I have even been on Trip Advisor to get reviews(good and bad)for this trip to see what people think of the experience for the thousands of pounds it has cost them, plus Mr Kandys sister has been sending us photos every day by Whats App so we can see some of the food they have eaten and scenery they have seen by train and coach etc.

I could never have imagined when I was a youngster just how technology would improve at such a fast pace over the years and I hope I live long enough to see many more inventions etc that will benefit us all for years to come

 

It is amazing the information the flight tracking gives on the airline sites . On my tablet I use FlightRadar24 app , it tracks all the registered flights in the UK . So if one is going overhead you click on it and it can tell you it's New York to Frankfurt , plane type landing time etc. I have no practical use for it , but when I am sitting in the garden it's nice to know where all the jet streams are going

 

Its quite easy to set your own system up using a cheap dongle you can also make your own antenna for it,
RTL-SDR Tutorial: Cheap ADS-B Aircraft RADAR - rtl-sdr.com

Flightradar will give you free equipment as long as you keep it live and they don't have any tracking in your area, i applied but it wasnt needed in my location.
Flightradar24.com - Live flight tracker!

 

I have a taxi app , it always advises one of these
1 - It's just round the corner.
2 - Be with you in 2 minutes.
3 - It's on it's way.

 

Sounds rather like Amazon Prime delivery promises before you buy, only when it's dispatched do you find out your purchase was in an Amazon warehouse in Barcelona, Milan, etc. and will take longer than you expected.

 

@shiney Mr Kandys sister went with Tixxn Travel so was picked up and dropped off back at home with their door to door people carrier service which is one of the reasons the trip is costly and also I think they were silly not taking a credit card away with them because I am sure if there had been a serious medical emergency and had had to go to hospital they would have needed one,but what do I know

We tracked them as the plane came into Heathrow and it tracked round in an effort to get the landing lights lined up right for landing.They were in cattle class going over and was not happy with the seating arrangements and was having a moan but as the plane was only two thirds full they were able to get a window seat so was then happy

 

@shiney I don’t know whether they bothered to look at the plane seating plans before they went so can’t answer that. They flew with Air Canada and they certainly wouldn’t have upgraded as she is what Mr Kandy calls miserly so wouldn’t even upgrade to Gold Leaf on the train which would have given better views of the scenery as she sent us a WhatsApp complaining of the first days travel on the train as the views were of tree,trees and more trees

They had travel insurance as her husband is a Type2 Diabetic and she has Ulcerative(sp) Colitis but didn’t tell Rocky Mountaineer of their dietary requirements but from what we can glean she was ok on the train.They stopped off at Toronto to get over the flying and to take her hubby to see Niagra Falls before they started the tour proper but as she doesn’t eat a lot at home, so when she did eat she was up all night with stomach problems if you get my drift so her hubby had to go and cancel the coach tour to the falls.

They did have travel Insurance as she said it was very expensive because of their health problems Apart form the train meals they lived on cakes and sandwiches as she refused to spend money out on hotel meals.No wonder her hubbys Diabetes levels are all over the place because sticky Canadian cakes won’t do him much good They did have some fish and chips allegedly from Barbs sea front shop on Victoria Island I think it was but that would have cost them an arm and a leg and she reckoned the Canadian Dollar was worth 60p in our currency

They had some currency that was loaded onto a card before they went but not sure if that was one card or two as she doesn’t trust her hubby with money as he might spend it

We will probably find out a bit more once we get back home from our walkabout

Good idea to get everything sorted before you go away especially if like you,you travel far and wide many times but this is their first long flight in many years so things have probably changed since the last time she went Canada.

She sent a text to say they didn’t sleep a wink on the plane back so don’t know what happened there. Also brother in law said that they would be getting fed every two hours on the plane going over to Toronto but not sure if that is truth or Waffle

 

@shiney Mr Kandy has just had a long email from his sister informing him that there was a lot of upset with the seating on the flight home due to a cock up with Tixan and Air Canada and they and others on the plane were given seating in rows apart from each other plus seatsapart from each other and it caused a lot of hassle but eventually they got two seats side by side but couldn’t see out of the windows.His sister said she knew that you can check 24hours before a flight about the seating but she was expecting that between their travel company and Air Canada they would have got seating arrangements in blocks as she called them so that related people could all sit together.I think she spent all day yesterday worrying about it all but as we are not nearby can’t pop round to find out exactly how she is

Think I won’t bother going abroad as it sounds too much hassle,much better to sit together in a metal box with Mr Kandy called a car

We agree about the credit card but can’t talk about it with her as this conversation was told to another relative who mentioned it to us thinking we knew about it

 

You could not possibly mean R**nair , @shiney . The company policy is to treat everyone equally as scum. I won't attach the Fascinating Aida video on budget airlines...........