Oh, the glamour of business travel…

At least, that’s what I thought before this trip.

We’d flown out to Miami for work (and yes, it was one of those dreamy, “how-is-this-my-life-now?” kind of trips).

Champagne as we sat down in our business class seats. Gorgeous meals. One of those luxury enclosed seated bits that makes you feel (just for a small moment) rather wonderful

We got to spend quality time with our son, enjoy the beaches, eat far too well, and sit in a room with some of the sharpest minds I know—people who somehow manage to be both wildly successful and ridiculously good fun.

Lots of amazing business insights,strategies and tactics that I’ll be sharing with you and my CCA students over the coming weeks.

So far, so fabulous.

But then… Friday morning hit.

We were gearing up for the final day of strategy sessions when Virgin Atlantic casually dropped a bombshell into my inbox: wait.

No “here’s what we’re doing to help.” Just… cancelled.

The Heathrow debacle had struck.

Cue the chaos. I spent hours trying to get through—calls (2 hour waits to get through), online chats, anything.

Eventually after 2 hours of trying, I managed to get through on the online chat to someone who offered us a return flight… on the 24th. 😳 (We were meant to fly home that evening on the 21st.)

Then we got cut off from our chat – (his last comment had been that we could of course arrange our own alternative transport and apply for reimbursement of the cost).

So began the scramble.

After endless scrolling, I found a 17-hour journey on Royal Air Maroc via Casablanca. Not ideal. But it would fly tonight and would get us home on Saturday, so I booked it.

Or thought I did.

Expedia confirmed it… and then said we were on the waitlist.

After more phone calls (this time with Royal Air Maroc), I was assured everything was fine. So off we went to the airport that evening.

And then—plot twist—everything was not fine.

The queue was full of irate, disappointed passengers, and when we finally reached the desk, we were told the flight was overbooked.

No seats. No options. No accountability.

We dashed over to Virgin’s desk hoping for some sort of miracle. The staff were lovely but helpless—still the 24th was still the earliest they could offer.

So there we were, stranded in Miami Airport, googling every possible way to escape the US and get home.

Eventually, I found a flight from Orlando the next day with Norse Atlantic.

But first, we had to get to Orlando.

We just managed to grab two last-minute seats on a flight with American Airlines and collapsed into an Orlando hotel room at 2am.

And THEN—just to keep things hectic – Virgin emailed us at 4am. They had a flight for us that evening. From Miami.

Too late.

We’d already spent thousands on the alternative flights and were in Orlando.

Taking that would’ve meant waving goodbye to any reimbursement for all the alternative flights AND getting back to Miami.

So, we stuck with Norse.

I checked the reviews while waiting to board (probably a mistake). Let’s just say… they weren’t glowing.

Highlights included:

🚩 “Worst journey of my life.”
🚩 “Do NOT eat the food.”
🚩 “I’d rather swim.”

Comforting.

But we made it onto the flight (despite being split up and my seats were squeezed next to the loos and I was seated with a toddler-heavy family).

To be fair the family were a delight and the kids were angels.

But my Oura ring tells me I clocked 29 minutes of actual sleep on that 8-hour flight.

Nick was brave (or foolish) enough to eat the plane food. He’s still paying the price.

But we’re home.

Exhausted, frazzled, grateful. And mildly traumatised.

So… what’s the takeaway?

I wish I could wrap this up with a neat life lesson. But honestly? Sometimes things just go wrong.

So if you ever look at someone living their “laptop lifestyle” and think it’s all cocktails, conferences and coastlines… remember 29 minutes of sleep on a night flight. 😅

Business travel can be glamorous—but it’s also chaotic, exhausting and often completely out of your control.

And that,is the very unfiltered reality of running your own business.

Would I do it again?

Probably.

But I might pack more snacks and earplugs next time.