The Current Debacle
scruffycritter and I spent the day at the San Francisco International Airport. Not because we had any special burning desire to be there, but because that's where our trip to Oregon turned into a complete debacle with no warning.
We left Dulles on time at 6:30 a.m., arriving at SFO at 9:50 a.m. local time. We were stunned to find that the flight we thought we had about an hour to get to was canceled. Calls to the United Reservations number were disconnected or promises long wait times, so scruffycritter spent about 3 hours all told in a line to which he was directed by a ticketing agent, only to be told that the first flights available to Seattle, Portland, Medford or Eugene would be on December 25. Oh, and he's in the wrong line.
Needless to say our cope was just a *BIT* frazzled at this point.
We went and got lunch (well, breakfast really but still, food) and contemplated our options. After another, shorter wait in a different line he managed to get the marginally helpful ticket agent to refund our money for the portion of the tickets unused (i.e., SFO to OTH). We picked up a voucher for discounted hotel rates and then went to pick up our checked bag. That took 2 hours by itself.
At long last, armed with a hotel reservation we went out into the rain to wait for the hotel shuttle. After a half-hour wait for the second shuttle (the first one having driven past without stopping) we have finally arrived at our hotel. Car rental reservations have not yet been made but will be shortly. It looks as if I'm going to be making the 12-hour-ish drive to North Bend tomorrow since that's the only thing that's going to get us home before Christmas. Now I just have to explain all of this to Mama.
Merry Christmas to us, indeed.
We left Dulles on time at 6:30 a.m., arriving at SFO at 9:50 a.m. local time. We were stunned to find that the flight we thought we had about an hour to get to was canceled. Calls to the United Reservations number were disconnected or promises long wait times, so scruffycritter spent about 3 hours all told in a line to which he was directed by a ticketing agent, only to be told that the first flights available to Seattle, Portland, Medford or Eugene would be on December 25. Oh, and he's in the wrong line.
Needless to say our cope was just a *BIT* frazzled at this point.
We went and got lunch (well, breakfast really but still, food) and contemplated our options. After another, shorter wait in a different line he managed to get the marginally helpful ticket agent to refund our money for the portion of the tickets unused (i.e., SFO to OTH). We picked up a voucher for discounted hotel rates and then went to pick up our checked bag. That took 2 hours by itself.
At long last, armed with a hotel reservation we went out into the rain to wait for the hotel shuttle. After a half-hour wait for the second shuttle (the first one having driven past without stopping) we have finally arrived at our hotel. Car rental reservations have not yet been made but will be shortly. It looks as if I'm going to be making the 12-hour-ish drive to North Bend tomorrow since that's the only thing that's going to get us home before Christmas. Now I just have to explain all of this to Mama.
Merry Christmas to us, indeed.