Bouldering Mats on Air France?

[Joan Mulloy]

I'm planning on flying to Font soon with Air France and taking my bouldering mat.

Their luggage allowance says the total (height+breadth+width) dimensions of your hold luggage can be up to 158cm, and up to 23kg or something. However, they also say you can bring skiis, bodyboards and golf clubs, with no size restrictions mentioned. Bit confusing..

My mat's total dimension is 176cm, and it's only 4.5kg (i.e. a pretty old, skinny one). Not sure if I should risk trying to bring it or just rent one out there.

Has anyone had any experience doing this recently? And how did you get on? What size is the mat you brought?

(Naturally it is very, very hard to get hold of a person in Air France and none of their answering machines could help me)

[Dave Flanagan]

Joan. Malcolm posted up the same question on UKB http://ukbouldering.com/board/index.php?topic=21836.0;topicseen and got a few replies.
I recently few AF to Font and took my small pad - which was significantly under the size guidelines - instead of risking my large one which was slightly over the guidelines.
I don't think it's worth the risk. Neil from Maisonbleau rents pads but they are shite, avoid. You can buy a reasonable looking pad in Decathlon for less than 100. Enjoy.

[Joan Mulloy]

Dave, cheers for your reply. Yes, I'm going on the trip with Malcolm - we were taking a two-pronged attack

Thought we'd check around for wisom before committing to renting..

Thanks very much, I hope the forescast improves