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AIRPORT MEMORIES ➜ CANUCKLAD

Stansted’s 30th birthday this year got me thinking about my favourite and most memorable airports.

Amsterdam Schiphol: The old Pier B clicker departure board fascinated me as a child as I waited to see what airline and destination would finally appear at the bottom.

Galway: Imagine the atmosphere/craic of a Irish village pub and you’ve got it.

Honolulu: The tropical flowers and palm trees and, back in the day, the lei girls welcoming you to the islands.

Vancouver International: From cycling along the runway with my pals, waving at, and occasionally getting a wave back from, the pilots, to returning as an adult to see the tower draped in the colours of the team all Vancouverites adore [the Canucks] as they tried to win the Stanley Cup.

➜ AMCWHIRTER

Edinburgh Turnhouse: When British United Airways broke British European Airways’ domestic monopoly on the London route with BAC1-11 jets. Back then the terminal had a temporary feel, and often there would be only a single aircraft on the tarmac.

Berlin Tempelhof: Pure 1930s nostalgia. Around 1970 I was fortunate to take one of Pan Am’s B727 flights from Frankfurt to Tempelhof and back. King Khalid International, Riyadh: I was in awe of its architecture during my trips back in 1995 and 2005. Dubai International: In 1973, I was taking a BEA Airtours B707 charter from London Gatwick to Bangkok that called at Dubai and Sri Lanka. At that time I had never heard of a place called Dubai. The terminal was small but it had style.

➜ DAVIDSMITH2

London Heathrow T2 and Ljubljana,

Slovenia: These were my second homes in the mid to late 1990s. Both became firm friends, as did the Johann Strauss bar at Vienna airport, which I visited twice a week on average.

Tirana, Albania: A real experience – just a hut in a field really. The man who brought the bags from the plane and put them through the hole in the wall for the waiting passengers was also a taxi driver, so if you got your case first and bagged him, I am not sure if anyone else ever got their luggage. All changed now, of course, but still very friendly and convenient.

Riga, Latvia: Of a similar vintage and also fun. If you arrived more than an hour before an early morning departure there was every chance that you would be picking up the milk bottles and bringing them in with you when they opened up. St Mary’s, Isles of Scilly:

This one proves that small is beautiful – as do the planes. The eight-seater Islanders are always fun.

Banjul, Gambia: My current favourite, entirely down to the friendly outdoor area/bar, where the beers are cheap and the people-watching is entertaining.

➜ TRAVELDOC

Belfast-Nutts Corner: Apart from the name, it was oh so fascinating in the late 1950s/early ’60s for a young lad to see Viscount and Vanguard aircraft offering the romance of travel to new places.

Koh Samui, Thailand: Still such a beautiful airport to travel to and from.

Donegal, Ireland: The most scenic take-off and approach views imaginable. Kai Tak, Hong Kong: Such an exciting approach and chaotic terminal.

Singapore Changi: My first major overseas international airport and so mind-boggling and stimulating.

➜ SUPERCHRIS

Berlin Tegel: I came as a student in the early 1990s and thought I’d arrived on a Bond set. Don Mueang, Bangkok: A golf course in the middle of two runways – just a brilliant idea and what could go wrong?

Birmingham: In my youth, sitting on a sunny bank watching planes take off. Ruined by the building of the T2 Eurohub.

London City: Before the expansion, it was so small you’d be in and out in ten minutes.

➜ FFIDRAC

Hong Kong, Kai Tak:

Landing during an approaching typhoon – a true rollercoaster ride – and then being stuck in the terminal for hours with the windows rattling before being able to continue onwards. Heathrow: When it was the Queen’s Building and Europa Building (later forming the basis for Terminal 2) and Oceanic Building (now T3).

Key West International: Sitting as a passenger in the co-pilot seat of an Air Florida commuter flight to Miami.

➜ ALAINBOY56

‘As a young lad it was fascinating to see Viscounts and Vanguards offering the romance of travel to new places’

Barbados: I remember visiting in the late 1960s on a British Overseas Airways Corporation VC10 and in the ’70s on B707s/B747s. It was a bit like Hawaii with the welcome that the islanders gave.

Southampton: As a boy I remember many times taking or collecting relatives and seeing all of those Bristol Freighters (with cars) going to the Channel Isles.

Luton: I first flew from [what resembled] a grand marquee terminal building in the mid1970s with Aviaco to Ibiza via Palma.

Dubai International: I recall seeing the first three aircraft that Emirates received in 1985 – an A300 and a B737 on loan from Pakistan International Airlines and [the first] B727 given by the Dubai Air Wing.