Dabolim: Holiday plans of many tourists went for a toss on Friday due to the taxi operators' strike as they couldn't put Saturday to much use either. Some were forced to reach the airport almost half a day prior to their flight departure. For some others it was a bitter end to their Goa holidays.
Andreas Nieling from Germany changed three buses, lugging heavy luggage from Arambol to get to the Goa International Airport. When a private tourist taxi driver offered to take him, they were threatened by people who came on scooters.
Many tourists with a few hours before their flight chose to sit outside the entrance of the departure terminal, laying out towels and cardboard boxes and eating packed lunches that they had asked their hotel to pack.
Frustrated at no taxi driver willing to take them to the airport, Divya Patel and her husband from Gujarat walked outside the gates of their hotel in Calangute on Friday and found a local willing to drop them to the airport for Rs 1,500. "We were not interested in bargaining, we just wanted to get home," she told TOI with six hours to go for their flight departure.
Ironically a number of hotels, offered to arrange transport to the airport at ungodly hours (between 4am and 5am) on Saturday morning, taking advantage of the night, even if flights were scheduled to depart on Saturday night.
A few tourist taxis were seen dropping tourists more than a kilometre away from the airport, fearing a backlash.
