PrintThe Volcanic eruption of Iceland's Eyjafjallajökull is causing travel difficulties for European riders heading to the Rolex Kentucky CCI****.
British riders Oliver Townend and William Fox-Pitt have had to scramble emergency travel plans to get to the United States to ride at Rolex Kentucky due to the volcanic ash cloud preventing almost all flights out of Europe, reported HorseandHound.com.
Both riders headed to Spain, where some flights are still operating.
Townend took a train from Crewe to London and then the Eurostar to Paris. But French train strikes meant he then had no other option than to take a 14-hour long taxi from Paris to Madrid, at the cost of $2,241.
“I got to Paris, and I knew that I had to persuade someone to drive me to Madrid,” Townend told the BBC. “I just thought, ‘[My Yorkshire accent’s] not that different to French,’ so I grabbed a bloke and explained that I had to get to Madrid—I am determined to get to Kentucky. I am in the back of a taxi speeding across the Pyrenees, and on Thursday I will be on my horse in Kentucky. It doesn't get much more exciting than this.
“I am not going to let it slip away just because of a volcano in Iceland,” he added. “I want to be there to represent Britain, and this is the biggest moment of my career so far and the biggest event of the year. To be honest, I am trying to see it as an adventure—this is where the Yorkshire grit kicks in.”
Indeed, Townend seemed as upbeat as possible considering the many obstacles in his path.
“It is like a movie script, which is ironic, because the only flight I can get out of here is a Spanish charter to Miami and Disneyworld,” he said. “I have now got to find a way to get from Miami to Lexington, Ky. And of course that is where the story really begins.”
Listen to Townend's account of his journey: http://www.lloydbell.co.uk/access/client_zone/Oliver%20Townend_version1.mp3
Meanwhile, Fox-Pitt had to catch a private flight to Madrid with Teresa Stopford-Sackville, owner of his ride Cool Mountain.
“We rushed home [after withdrawing early from Belton Horse Trials] on Saturday night as panic was setting in that I was not going to be able to get to America on my Monday morning flight out of Heathrow,” Fox-Pitt blogged. "We eventually managed to book a flight from Madrid to Miami on Monday afternoon. But then came the drama of trying to work out how to get us to Madrid.”
Like Townend, Fox-Pitt had booked a ticket on the Eurostar train from London to Paris on Sunday afternoon, but he got to his local station too late and missed the connection to London.
“But thanks to local hero and hunt master James Gibson-Fleming, we commandeered his single piston airplane, and he agreed to fly myself and Teresa Stopford-Sackville to Madrid at 4 a.m. on Monday morning by visual controls,” Fox-Pitt said. “After a beautiful flight down the French coast, Teresa and I have arrived at Madrid airport. We have checked in for our flight to Miami later this afternoon.”
