“…and your café con leche. That makes everything 8,80 euros, please.” It is late on Saturday afternoon when the waiter brings me the coffee I ordered along with the bill. Another mild, summery day on the beach in Maspalomas, on the third largest Canary Island of Gran Canaria, is coming to an end. Since I no longer have any work-related night flights to Germany across the North Atlantic in my schedule, I rarely drink coffee after 17 p.m. Today, however, things are different. My return flight to the London metropolitan area is scheduled for the evening, at an unusually late hour and already quite late at night. Three flights to the London area on Saturday afternoon were shown to me in the advance planning. easyJet to London-Luton, Jet2 to London-Stansted and Wizz Air UK, also with Luton as my destination airport. Since I had already flown Jet2 in the past and EasyJet occasionally crosses my flight plans anyway, I found the option with the British subsidiary of the rapidly growing Wizz Air Group by far the most interesting. With over 40 bases in 21 European and Middle Eastern countries, 1140 routes and currently around 150 Airbus aircraft of the A320ceo, 320neo, 321ceo and 321neo types, Wizz Air is one of the fastest growing airlines in European airspace in recent years. The main business model as a low-cost carrier in Eastern Europe has been a complete success, with Wizz Air often flying to destinations where I have to look for the 3-letter code myself. But in addition to the growing VFR traffic and a large number of bases in Eastern Europe, Wizz Air is also aggressively trying to expand into other

Flying from Mallorca to Gran Canaria in an Embraer 195-E2... - that used to be associated with a certain magic. With anticipation, for some people over a whole year in advance. I remember economy class flights in a trijet to the Caribbean. When each passenger boarded the plane, a small "care package" was waiting for them at their seat, including a small bottle of champagne, long before any kind of in-flight service began. The overhead storage compartments were better hat racks and not "littered" like today. Yes, flying has changed... a lot, to be precise. When the first flight took place in 1989, back then as an Iberia subsidiary with four (Casa) CN-235s, Binter was one of only a few airlines to use this type of aircraft. An aircraft that was popular with the military, but never really in civil aviation. With 40 seats, flights between the Canary Islands were initially started hesitantly. Just like aviation, Binter Canarias has also changed in the past 33 years of its own company history. Away from being an Iberia subsidiary and on its own two feet, away from being a "pure island hopper" between the Canaries, towards a full-service airline with various pillars. Before the first of the five Embraer 2019 jets of the latest generation "E195" was put into service in 2, Binter had already flown with a Boeing 2005-2008 (EC-INQ) of the Spanish charter airline Futura between 737 and 400. After that, several CRJ1000 jets were used at times to bridge the time until the brand new E-Jets were delivered. Today, Binter flies with a

In the Condor Airbus A330-200 from Palma de Mallorca to Frankfurt. "And that makes it 07:03, good morning Mallorca," sounds from the loudspeakers of the rented bright red A-Class as I throw my backpack into the trunk. "We are expecting a wonderful day with top temperatures of up to 21 degrees and 11 hours of sunshine on the most beautiful island in the world," reports the island's German-language radio station. The small village in the east of the island is still shrouded in a mixture of morning dew and fog, the air is already wonderful. Like so many Germans, I have been a regular visitor to "the Germans' favorite island" for more than 20 years, and leaving is always difficult. Only a few places in Europe offer such a great cultural diversity in such a limited space as Mallorca. The excellent accessibility, sometimes several times a day, from the DACH region with a short flight time of just 1,5 to a maximum of 2,5 hours (depending on the departure location) does the rest. There are regions in Germany that are less well connected to public transport. If the numerous industry experts and forecasts are to be believed, the Balearic Islands and thus also Mallorca will celebrate a major tourist comeback in 2022. The published flight schedules and bookable flights even speak of 2022% or more capacity in 10 than in the "pre-Corona" year of 2019. No Spanish region is expecting greater growth rates this year, and the Easter holidays that have just ended were already a first foretaste. Up to 800 take-offs and landings per day during the Easter holidays as well as numerous wide-body jets at Son Sant Joan Airport in

"Secret" service, free baggage allowance and a strategic advantage - in the Aer Lingus A320 from Dublin to Berlin It is still the middle of the night when I hear the front door slam. Laughter and loud voices echo through the corridor, and in the background the sounds of "I'm Shipping Up to Boston" play from the speaker of a smartphone. It is THE Irish week, in which Ireland's probably most famous holiday is celebrated: "St. Patrick's Day". When I stop at an Irish pub on the wild coast in the afternoon, the owner, a woman in her mid-fifties, is tapping several beers. "Where are you from, mate?" she asks in that charming Irish accent after I've ordered a coffee to go. Before I can answer her question, she replies: "It doesn't matter, you're here now, so you're one of us." The former Irish train station in the small town in the east of the island, which has 1600 inhabitants and has been converted into a pub, is decorated from top to bottom in the national colors and with green clovers. The same three-leaf clover also decorates the vertical stabilizer of the Irish national carrier "Aer Lingus", which can look back on an impressive 3-year history. Ireland is nature, good food, world-famous (mostly alcoholic) drinks and these wonderful, hospitable people. Under these circumstances, Aer Lingus should actually have an easy time filling its jets. That's the theory, but in practice it's a little different. Dublin is not only the home port of "Shamrock", hence the call sign of "EI", but also of Europe's largest low-cost airline.