Archive for the ‘Angouleme’ tag
Angoulême flights to London on hold; maybe permanently
Plans by Angoulême Airport in the Charente to work with CityLineSwiss to provide a new service to London Gatwick have been put on hold. The airline says they the flights, which should have begun in late May or early June, have been postponed to the autumn.  However there are now serious doubts about the viability of commercial flights at the airport and thus the future of any UK service from the Charente. The problem is that the various local authorities who provide much of the funding for the airport are worried about who picks up the bill if the Gatwick service makes a loss. ‘We’re not a bank,’ says department council president Michel Boutant. The mayor of Angoulême Philippe Lavaud, who heads a coalition of socialist and greens, is also ideologically more in favour of trains than planes. ‘They pollute less,’ he says. Daniel Braud, president of the chamber of commerce (CCI) who run the airport, and himself a keen fan of the flights, is now publicly wondering whether they can hope to maintain a service in the future. For more information on the status of the flights – including those to Marseille and Pau – visit the CityLineSwis website.
UK flights to Angoulême in Charente – CityLine Swiss now booking (from 10 April…)
The Charente and Angoulême have got their flights to London back. On Saturday 10 April CityLine Swiss – a subsidiary of Cityline Hungary – began accepting reservations for flights starting later this spring at the end of May between the Angoulême-Cognac International Airport and the UK. The flights are to London Gatwick and will be three times a week – on Monday, Tuesday and Friday. Tickets are at €55, which includes a snack and soft drink on board the aircraft, a McDonnell Douglas 83, with a capacity of 150 passengers. Passengers will be allowed one item of hand luggage and hold luggage up to 20kg a person will be free. The airport has been working hard to find a company willing to take on flights to the UK after its well-publicised battles with Ryanair over money. Ryanair terminated its agreement with the airport after the latter refused to put up more cash for the Irish airline. As an added bonus for people in the region, CityLine Swiss will also be operating flights to Marseille and Lyon, at €99 a ticket.
Angoulême airport – new flights soon between Charente and Gatwick?
The airline behind the planned flights from Angouleme - CityLine Hungary
After the disappearance of the Ryanair service, Angoulême Airport in Poitou-Charentes hopes to set up a new service to London Gatwick with Hungarian airline CityLine Hungary. Negotiations are well advanced to establish a three flights a week service to Gatwick on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The all-year service would be reduced to two flights a week from November to April.
Restaurants in Angoul̻me Рeven the best no longer open all hours?
One of the joys of Angoulême is its many restaurants – at the last count there were about 80 restaurants in the Charente capital in all. Many of them. including some of the best, are based around the old historic centre of Angoulême.
However, according to the regional paper the Charente Libre, while there may be plenty of restaurants in Angoulême, finding one to eat in at the end of the evening is no easy matter. The simple question: ‘Is is too late to get something to eat?’ is apparently being heard more and more as many places close their kitchens by 10.30pm. ‘We get asked it regularly, even if it’s still only 9.30pm or 1.30pm,’ staff at Lieu-Dit, rue de Genève, told the newspaper. This restaurant serves meals until 11pm even if ‘during the week we can send out the last coffees at 9.30pm because there are no later customers’.
Ryanair pull out of Angoulême Airport in Charente
Up, up and away...for good
The flights between London Stansted and the airport near Angoulême in the Charente have come to an abrupt end. Ryanair have pulled out of the service with immediate effect, despite the fact that the five-year they signed with the airport authorities runs until 2012. How has this situation arisen on a new route that had already proved popular with passengers?
Essentially it’s been a row about money. Late in 2009 Ryanair demanded more money from the Angoulême airport authorities to continue the service, making it clear that if no more cash was put up, the flights would end. The authorities in the Charente, not unreasonably, said that they would abide by the terms of the existing contract and would not therefore hand over any more money for what are described as ‘marketing fees’. Read the rest of this entry »