One of the most important of the international airports serving Wales, Cardiff Airport primarily runs its scheduled flights to the UK, Spain, and the Netherlands with a few going to other select European cities. Although bmibaby, Cardiff Airport’s primary carrier handles about 50% of the traffic out of Cardiff, there are a number of other charter airlines that add further destinations across the northern Mediterranean region as far East as Larnaca. Charter service can be found flying out of Cardiff to the Canary Islands and a few transatlantic flights to Alicante, Mexico and several Caribbean Islands including Jamaica and Barbados.

Cardiff Airport has recently begun offering the ePassport Gate service. In partnership with the UK Border Agency, the new ePassport is micro-chipped and the automated gates use state of the art facial recognition software to make the security check process much easier and swifter than the manual security clearance methods.

While waiting for your flight out of Cardiff, there are plenty of places and activities to keep you occupied. After passing through the Departures Gate, you can choose between the Echo Bar which offers music video along with a full menu and alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks or the Cafe Ritazza which offers hot and cold drinks, teas, coffee, and pastries. Also available in the Departure lounge is a WH Smith store. From here you can select between a full range of books and newspapers along with snacks, confectioneries, gifts and tobacco products.

A note to remember when you have to travel from Cardiff, making your bookings and reservations online gives you access to many promotional discounts on various goods and services.

Cardiff airport is located to the west of Cardiff city (the capital of Wales) in the Vale of Glamorgan and offers international flights to and from Wales. This airport is the pathway for about 1.9 million passengers in a year, flying them to and from the 60 destinations available from the airport. It is the only airport in Wales that offers worldwide scheduled flights and also provides a centre for the general and communal aviation industry.

Cardiff international airport is the only one present in Wales which offers the Trans-Atlantic flights such as the flights to Canada, Florida, Toronto and Orlando which operate right the way through the summer season. The most popular destinations of the flights to and from this airport include the flights to and from Malaga, Alicante, Palma de Mallorca, Amsterdam, Edinburgh, Dublin, Glasgow, Paris, Newcastle, Geneva, Cork, Las Palmas and Belfast. However, the vast majority of the global flights from this airport are to Ireland, Spain and the Netherlands.

The airport boasts a fabulous range of facilities including food and shopping to the travellers, convenient public transportation to and from the airport, and pre-booking of parking online to save you time. If you are in Cardiff and want to have a break from your busy schedule then it is the place to start your holiday trip with your friends and family – this airport will offer you the best and most convenient flights to some of the most popular holiday destinations in the world; book your tickets today and get packing! You’ve earned it!

If you want a place to park that is affordable (essential in this age of recession where every penny you can save at home is money that can be better spent on your travels) and very close to the airport, then the car park at Cardiff airport is by far the best choice. With a car park that is a few minutes’ walk from the airport you can rest assured knowing that even if you are running a little bit late, it shouldn’t have a tremendous impact upon your journey or your ability to catch the flight. This means that you will be able to travel with very little stress and will have a much more enjoyable trip which is a much better way to start your holiday!

Of course, you may decide that you don’t want to park your car at the airport. Perhaps you’d rather take a taxi or a train to the airport in order to get yourself there so that you can save some money. This seems like a plausible idea and is one that many people have done with the same thinking. However, this is not the case. The cost of train or taxi can often top £100 which is a lot of money to fork out for something that causes you more hassle than is necessary. If you park at the airport then it will work out cheaper and, on top of this, you will be much closer to your flight so you won’t have to worry about missing it.

There aren’t a vast number of airports in Wales, which leaves the Welsh people in a bit of a dilemma. The question on many of their lips is whether they will have to travel into Britain to have a real choice as to holiday destinations or whether Cardiff airport offers a suitable range instead. This is something that many people in England simply cannot grasp because there are so many airports to make such questions irrelevant; you don’t have to travel for more than a couple of hours before you arrive at another airport which may have more choice. However, for people living on the western coast of Wales then this is a very important query as, if Cardiff doesn’t offer a sufficient range of destinations, they will have to travel into England; a long journey that would require a stopover along the way – more money being spent at a time when cheap holidays are most desirable. It is very important that the choice of flights at Cardiff airport doesn’t restrict the people in Wales who want to go on holiday.

Thankfully, this is the case at Cardiff airport. If you want to fly somewhere then there is almost certainly a cheap flight heading out there; particularly during the summer months. There are numerous flights to Paris and Nice for those of you wanting to have a French holiday or you can catch the sun in Spain with flights to Alicante and Malaga. These are desirable spots that can be flown to from Cardiff.

The difficulty that people have when they are wanting to fly somewhere is that the cheaper airlines often fly at unreasonable times. Sure, we would all like to fly at midday where you can wake up at a reasonable time and drive down on the day but the fact of the matter is that you will have to pay through the roof for the privilege which, in this recession where people are having to scrape the pennies together just to be able to go on holiday, is the last thing that you mean. Opting for Jet2 or Ryanair has the advantage of being affordable which is the most important thing. However, the flights will often leave Cardiff airport either early morning or late at night.

For an early morning flight, it is advisable to stay in one of the 2 hotels that are situated a few minutes’ walk away from the airport. The Holiday Inn and the Wales Airport Hotel both offer a fantastic service for people who are staying for part of the night. The restaurants close by will have food served around the clock and you will have a bed to stay in for some of the night. You will be able to wake up at a more reasonable time and fall out of bed and almost straight away, into the airport. There is less hassle, less stress and less chance of lateness than if you were to drive down on the day and you will at least be able to catch a few hours’ kip before your flight.

For security, the best way to prepare for a flight is to ensure that you are there with plenty of time to spare. The airport generally advises you to ensure that you are at the airport 2 hours before your flight departs which is fine if you live close by. However, there are so many variables when you are driving that are out of your control which means that your 2 hours slowly disappears and leaves you late for your flight – all it takes is a crash on the motorway or a train to be cancelled and your hopes of arriving early are dashed. The best option is to travel down the day before and stay overnight at a hotel that is close to the airport.

The Holiday Inn Express which is located nearby Cardiff airport is the best place that you can choose to stay. The staff are incredibly helpful and able to respond quickly to any needs you may have or problems that may arise which makes your stay incredibly relaxing and enjoyable. Because you are close to the airport, you can roll out of bed at your leisure and have a lovely buffet breakfast, where all sorts of food – from healthy cereals to full English breakfasts – are on offer. The most important factor, however, is that there is no chance of being late for your flight – at a stretch you may arrive with only an hour and a half left before your flight; hardly anything to split hairs about!

In this age of recession, nobody wants to pay too much for a holiday. We are currently seeing the lowest number of British tourists venturing out of the country in over two decades and this down almost solely down to the fact that people just have less money to spend. Even the businessmen are not flying to the same exotic locations that they did annually in the last few years – preferring instead to visit cheaper locations. For the majority of families, a holiday abroad is simply out of the question – everything is too expensive; the exchange rate means that when you get to the destination, it will cost a fortune and there are fears that you won’t even be able to afford the flights out there – every cost needs to be multiplied up and the pounds just keep piling on! It seems an impossible task trying to find a holiday for a good price.

However, this is not necessarily the case. Cheap airlines have been sneered at in recent years but now appear to be the saviour of the holiday abroad. Airlines such as Jet2 and Ryanair fly out of Cardiff airport every day and offer flights for as little as £40. This will mean that you have plenty of money left over as excess for the costs you will have when you’re abroad. This way, there is little chance that you’ll be caught short when you’re paying for a meal at the restaurant and you should have more than enough to be able to offset those pesky exchange rates.

I do not tend to stay at airport hotels as I tend to expect them to be poor value for money. I always think that they have an easy market and so will charge more than they need to and not provide a good service. I was in a situation recently where I needed to stay at one of these hotels and I was not looking forward to it at all. In fact I was quite worried about the situation.

I have stayed in a lot of different hotels in the past and some have been of a very poor standard, ranging from cigarette burns on the sheets in a non-smoking room to having rats in the wardrobe. I was therefore very concerned when told I would be staying in the Cardiff airport hotel because it was so close to the place I was working, I would not need a hire car. Once I discovered it was a Holiday Inn, I felt better because I know that they do have a good reputation and even though it is only an Express, I was sure they would want to maintain the standard that their chain adheres to. In fact I was very pleased with the accommodation, it was perhaps pricey, but then I was not paying so I did not check, but it was certainly comfortable, clean and friendly. It was also nice to be staying close enough to where I was working that I could walk and not have to worry about driving through the Cardiff traffic.

Every airport worth its salt has a system of car parks within easy walking distance. It’s not difficult to see why – if you are driving to the airport, whether to see someone off or to head off yourself, you need somewhere to put the car. Cardiff Airport is no different. Whether you are just going to use the short stay car park to say goodbye to a loved one or park in the long stay car park if you’re jetting off yourself, you must use one of the car parks. It is now made twice as easy because you no longer have to buy tickets when you arrive; you can book online before you get there or ring up when you’re there and have a space reserved for you without the need to arrive extra early. Using the car park is much easier than trying to agree with someone else to pick you up and drop you off; with so many flights delayed it’s way too difficult to do that.

Once parked you can relax in the airport, get yourself checked in and be on your way without having to worry about whether the car is secure. All the car parks around the airport are safe and monitored by CCTV and, as such, you can have no fears about leaving your car behind. In fact, to not do so would be madness; it saves you the hassle when you get back of having to wait around for a taxi or a relative – you can jump in your car and be back home before you know it.