Fly Away

Six or seven months ago we were trying to plan our big summer vacation.  We wanted a place that wasn't too hot or too expensive.  Scandinavia was high our list because we have family from Sweden.  But it didn't seem very interesting so we turned to Europe.  We were convinced by a family member to go to Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. (They have great roads there!) So in a couple of weeks we're flying to Luxembourg via Toronto and some other place like Munich. Point is we have to backtrack to get to Luxembourg.   We'll then get on a bus, train or taxi and travel 45 minutes into the German city of Trier. The tour company information advised a shuttle bus to Trier but to make the required reservations you have to navigate a site that appears to only give information on getting TO the airport not away from it. So who knows how we'll get to our hotel.  I'm thinking a taxi sounds great after 15 hours of planes and airports.

And let's talk about airlines.  We're flying Air Canada, operated by Lufthansa (or is it the other way around) on the way there and Austrian Airlines operated by Air Canada on the way back.  We also have a short flight on Luxor Air operated by..... ah maybe Lufthansa again. We fly out of Europe from Vienna, not Luxembourg where we entered.  It's so confusing for the airlines when you fly in to one city and out of another. They have to charge you about  $1,000 extra to figure it out.

We could only get seats on one flight. Why? I made reservations for all six flights at the same time. What makes that one flight so special?  Really, I can't get  seat assignments after spending a small fortune to travel during peak season?  Wouldn't it be more efficient to let passengers choose their seats in the beginning instead of complaining later on?  One airline has inexplicably assigned us seats 55A and B and we can't change them - yet. This is where the complaining will come in.  Do you know where those seats are?  You might as well be sitting in the bathroom you're so far back.  They're so far back the engine noise drowns out any other sounds. You spend the entire flight watching the people in line for the bathroom try not to stare at you and trying not to stare back at them.  And this is a long flight, one of the 5 or 8 hour ones.  We booked this flight six months ago so I can't imagine those were the only seats left.  I'll definitely need an Ambien for this flight.

After seeing to the seats you have to examine the itinerary for food.  Some flights provide food and others don't.  There's no rhyme or reason.  One 5 hour flight has "food" for sale and a 55 minute one says it provides a meal. What's with that?  Five hours and all you get is a box of crappy snacks for $10. I think I'll do PB & J for that flight since it's the first leg. Then on the "meal provided" flights we can pick a kind of meal.  There are 3, yes 3, different kinds of vegetarian meals which I can't figure out.   I don't need gluten free or vegan or some kind of dairy/egg thing.  I signed up for a Kosher meal.  I've had moderate success with that choice.  It's usually a little better than the regular meal.  We hope.

Last time we were on a cold flight there were no blankets or pillows so we now bring our own. I know lots of people bring them for sanitary reasons but I really don't care about that. Does that make me disgusting? Maybe, but when I was growing up we fairly groveled in dirt and germs compared to people today and I managed to survive. The upshot is you can't rely on airlines to provide much more than a seat so we bring our own comfort.

As we venture out onto airplanes around the world, wish us luck or at least some decent seats.