The Trip from Hell

This is the story of one of the worst travel experiences that I have had by far, and I have travelled a lot over the last 20 years.

This happened in April 2009, and although the detailed memories are not as clear as they were back then, I did fortunately write a lot down in my journal, and it seems strange now to recall them in such detail.

First some background would help I suppose, just so everything fits into the correct context.

I was living in Florida, and working on moving back to my native England a few months later, having lived in the USA for 15 years, but met my soul mate Debbie online while researching my family history. The weirdest thing is that she lived only 30 miles from where I grew up.

I had lost my job 6 weeks before, and since Debbie only gets 2 weeks off work (Easter school holidays in the UK) and the flights from the UK to Florida cost hundreds of dollars more than from Florida to the UK, we decided that I would go to see her for 3 weeks instead of her coming to see me.

I set off from home Saturday morning. My landlord dropped me at the Tri-Rail station at 10:15am, it being cheaper to take the train ($4) from Deerfield Beach to the airport than to drive there and pay to park. My flight wasn't until 2:10pm, and the train journey is only 30 minutes, but there is free internet at Fort Lauderdale Airport, so I wasn't bothered about the long wait.

Well the train runs every 30 minutes during the week, but only every 2 hours at the weekend, and it was heaving with people. The Tri-Rail only has 3 carriages, and mine had 3 bicycles, a dozen people with bags and suitcases, and it was standing room only. 2/3rds of the way we stopped twice for long periods because of signal problems, so the journey took an hour. It was extremely warm as the air conditioning wasn't working properly, then the shuttle bus to the airport terminal took 10 minutes to arrive. So by the time I got to the terminal I was soaked with sweat.

The bus stopped a long way past the terminal that I needed for Delta Airlines, so I had to lug my bags all the way back.

The ticket counter at Fort Lauderdale is on the 2nd floor, but the up escalator at the near end wasn't working, so I had to walk all the way to the other end of the terminal, and by the time I got to the check in desk I was literally dripping. Of course the air conditioning in the terminal wasn't working properly either, and all the staff were complaining. I actually soaked my handkerchief just wiping my head and neck. This is not the best way to begin a journey that consists of 2 flights, one of which is an overnight one.

Well I go to check in, and find much to my horror that my suitcase is TEN POUNDS OVERWEIGHT, and they want to charge me $150 to transport it. Did I tell you about the bag? No? Ok this is where it gets more frustrating and in a way comical...

Debbie has been visiting me every 6-7 weeks for the past 18 months, and she has been bringing more and more summer clothing over to save having to carry it in both directions every time. Since she isn't going to be coming over again before I move back, I am bringing a lot of her clothes home this time. I already have a lot of my clothes at her house, so didn't need to pack much for myself though.

Shall I say that being unemployed I had a mild panic attack, but then realized that my carry on bag was mostly empty, so I opened my suitcase, took out all of her shoes, as they were the heaviest items, a book and a fleece jacket, and with a sigh of relief found that the bag now weighs 11lbs less. PHEW! Of course now my carry on is incredibly heavy, full to bursting, I have another thick binder of papers in my laptop bag, and by the time I got my boarding pass I was not so much soaked as melting. I have been known to be drier when I come out of the shower!

Well I get to the gate, only to find that the agent didn't give me back the printed copy of my itinerary either, but at this point I no longer needed it. I did think to myself though "I hope nobody opens my suitcase - it could be embarrassing being full of women's clothing..."

Well now the one thing that did go right happens, I find a seat in the terminal next to a nice couple, and it's one of the few spots in the terminal where you have access to a power socket, so I was able to plug the laptop in and also Skype worked so I could have a chat with Debbie and update her, and then watched NASA TV so see the shuttle land. The weather wasn't good so the shuttle landed an hour late. My plane was also delayed 35 minutes because of bad weather in Atlanta when it left, so I finally left at 3pm instead of 2:10pm, and there were now only 70 minutes left between the flights.

The pilot made up much of the time, but then 20 minutes from Atlanta, we were informed that the weather there was awful, so we had to go past the weather and circle for ages. It was also the bumpiest flight I have had in my 20 years of frequent flying, the whole plane being shaken from side to side. Finally we land in Atlanta, 10 minutes after my plane for London was due to leave, and of course it had left - on time!

I joined a lot of other people in a long queue at a Delta ticket desk, where 2 women were slowly assisting 2 people. Then they both assisted the same person. For about 20 minutes nothing moved, and then one of the women upped and left as it was the end of her shift, leaving just one person to deal with about 20 angry people.

Finally my turn came, and this woman said I had been reconfirmed on the same flight - TOMORROW! That meant spending 24 hours in the airport! She was so unhelpful, and they wouldn't pay for a hotel, but I did manage to get some meal vouchers and then left to head to the terminal, which of course is the complete opposite end of the airport, a long train journey.

I get to the other terminal, and there is another Delta ticket desk, and I find that there is also a later flight at 10:10pm. So I join the long queue to see if I can get a standby on that flightr or if there are any other options. Meantime it's now 7:30pm, I landed 2 hours ago, and I have been getting nowhere. I finally get helped, and a friendly lady gave me a standby ticket for the 10:10pm flight. Now this was also going to London Heathrow not Gatwick, which is a lot better for Debbie to pick me up, so I was hopeful that things might get better.

At this time another guy joins me. He was also on my flight from Fort Lauderdale, and had waited back at the first desk, where another person had turned up and he already had a standby ticket for the flight, plus she gave him a hotel voucher and meal vouchers.

The two of us decide to stick together, and head off for a bite to eat before going to the gate to register our standby requests. We get there at 9pm, and at that time there are not a lot of people waiting for the 10:10pm flight. We are somewhat hopeful. But of course time marches on, more and more people arrive, then the gate attendant announces that the cleaning crew haven't finished cleaning the plane, so they can't begin boarding for another 30 minutes.

Time drags on, even more people arrive, more announcements to say that the cleaning crew are not yet done. What on earth happened in there? Did a toilet overflow? With all that suction I would hope not! Did 50 people end up throwing up because of turbulence? That would be bad, but you know, I just wanted to get on that plane - I would have handled it. It was the last flight of the night, so my only option for not spending the night at the airport.

Well further delays, the departure time is changed to 11:40pm, more people arrive, and about 11pm they begin to board. Things don't look good, but there are still two people not checked in. They arrive about 5 minutes before the doors close, but there is 1 seat available, for the guy I am with. It's seat 1A, First Class too! By this time it's 11:15pm, over an hour after the flight was due to leave, and just as the attendant is about to put the ticket in his hands, up marches the final passenger, and of course it's her seat. No more room, about a dozen people are turned away. The two of use waiting there were really disheartened, since 24 hours with nothing to do but kill time is no fun, I lose a day with Debbie, and he misses a day with his daughter, who works in London.

So back we to the Delta ticket counter again, another 20 minute wait. He already has his hotel voucher, and heads off to get the shuttle to the hotel. I get to the desk, to find out that the voucher is only for a discounted price, and it would still cost me $49 for a room at the cheapest hotel. Well add onto that taxes etc, and you are talking closer to $80, so I turned that down, and resigned myself to having to spend the night in the terminal. I am out of work after all. By this time I am feeling a bit like Tom Hanks in the movie "The Terminal", where he ends up not being able to fly home, and immigration won't allow him into the country, so he spends months living in the airport.

As is usual in an airport, the seats have armrests and it's almost impossible to lie down. I asked one of the employees where the most comfortable spot might be, and he directed me to a section of gates where there are long seats plus others without backrests. I was able to pull these together and made a fairly comfortable bed for the night. Well not exactly comfortable, but as good as could be expected for the night. It is by this time midnight... and I am exhausted...

Just as I go to settle down, this elderly man comes up, and kindly offers me an airline blanket. From a first glance I thought he was asking for money, but I later realized he was just already dressed ready to spend the night there himself, he has obviously played this game before. I accepted the blanket, and in the end needed it, as the terminal got extremely cold during the night. He comes and lies down at the other end of my set of seats, and then we both try to sleep, but it's not only freezing cold in the terminal, it seems like the volume of the televisions in the area was has been turned way up, and the cleaners kept banging vacuums and polishers into the seating as well as talking loudly. Any movement by either of us also caused a lot of vibration, so just turning over woke the other up.

Well first this man decides he wants to talk. I find out he is Russian and was married to a Mexican woman. His English is not so good, so we end up speaking in a common language - Spanglish! I can't make out all he is saying since my Spanish is a bit rusty, and he was using words I didn't know (Mexican has quite a few words of their own), but finally I get to sleep for a while, but mostly it's tossing and turning and trying to stay warm for a couple of hours. I was rather pleased by now that I had taken my fleece out of my suitcase, as I needed that, and I also had a cardigan in my hand baggage that I used as a pillow. If not for those I would have had a really bad night, but nevertheless I did still spend most of the night shivering.

At 3am Debbie called me, so I got up and had a chat with her, washed my face, and then tried to get back to sleep.

The Russian started getting up at 4:30am. Seems his flight was soon after 5am, and he wanted to talk more. I think he thought that my flight was also at 5am, but alas it wasn't going to be until 5pm. At 5am he disappeared, and I managed some more broken sleep until 7am, when I washed up a bit, then went to the food court and had a bite to eat, and called Debbie.

Cleaning up was frustrating too. Of course you can't carry your wash bag with you these days then you are flying, and I already have everything I need in England. I was able to get a bag from Delta, which had a thin overnight t-shirt in it, a toothbrush and squeeze out toothpaste that was more like a ketchup packet, so the toothpaste would only be good for one use. It also had a disposable razor and another shaving gel packet, that had about 1/4 of the amount needed, would not foam up, and the razor was so bad it was trying to tear my skin off while leaving the hairs behind, so I decided to give that a miss. Better unshaven than badly shaven and incredibly sore. Add to this trying to do this in the washrooms. You know the ones where the taps only work when you move your hands just right? Well it's really hard to do this with a toothbrush or a razor. Just take my word for it... But at least I brushed my teeth, and they had a deodorant in the bag too. Not a great one, but a deodorant nevertheless, and by this time I really needed it.

Around 10am with 7 hours of boredom left, found me sitting in the food court, which is the only area in the terminal where you get free internet. I managed to use a meal voucher to get a bite to eat, and had a chat with Debbie online. It was hard to type as I was shaking a lot from being so tired. I had a feeling though that being able to get a free upgrade to either Business or First Class to compensate for my inconvenience would be impossible. But as long as I got on the plane and it arrived on time I knew that I would be happy.

I spent the next few hours snoozing and watching a couple of movies on my laptop, then used my final meal voucher to get a decent burger from one of the restaurants in the terminal, and in a daze the hours finally drifted past, and it was time to head to the gate to catch the flight to London.

Of course the plane that I am going to take is my original flight, just 24 hours later, and it's going to Gatwick as per the original plan, which is a longer journey for Debbie to make. It's now going to be on a Monday morning not Sunday morning when I arrive in London, so the traffic will be horrible, and she is supposed to be working that day too. I will by the time I arrive definitely not be smelling too good either. Delta wouldn't give anyone their bags back, so I have no clothes to change into. I also won't have shaved for 2 days by the time that I arrive.

The flight Sunday night left on time thankfully, and arrived at Gatwick airport almost an hour early. No queues to go through passport control or customs, my bag came off quickly, and I was standing outside for about 5 minutes when Debbie turned up, so she didn't have to pay to park either, which costs a small fortune at airports in the UK.

It took about 2 hours to get home, since it was Monday Morning Rush Hour, but we made it. I had a wonderful shower, it felt good to change clothes after 2 days wearing the same things, had a bite to eat, then upstairs for a nice long nap in a real bed, a very pleasant change, having not slept in a bed or had much sleep at all for the last 2 nights.

Well that is the story of the worse trip that I have ever been on, a real comedy of errors, and what was actually a really horrible night in the terminal, freezing cold, exhausted, frustrated, and just wanting to be home with my fiancée.

My friends know the end of the story of course. I am now back living in England, Debbie and I got married in April 2010, and we are just so happy to be together.