Taranjit
When we booked our flight, we decided to take the flight with two stops because it was cheaper than the one with one stop. Now this was our first time going to Australia, so we had no idea what to expect. Our thought process was that having two stops would not be terrible considering it is a long flight and it would allow us to have a little break before getting stuck on another plane for a large period of time. Considering we lived on the east coast, we had to have at least one stop domestically before we got on a plane to take us all the way to Australia.
Since there were four of us traveling on this trip, we opted for the second stop in Sydney before getting on the next flight to Melbourne because it saved us a good chunk of money. And if you are not as strong financially, you probably would have done the same thing (or you might have decided against going altogether, but that’s your prerogative).
I feel this trip was cursed from the beginning. (I hope yours is not). The day that we had to board our first flight from Dulles to Dallas, we hit major traffic. Not the usual rush hour traffic, which we accounted for before we left the house (and I always leave buffer room to where we normally get to the airport way earlier than needed. Better early than late), but quadruple times rush hour traffic. And if you know Maryland/DC traffic, then you probably know what I mean. But it was as if the universe was trying to make this journey as difficult as possible. There were literally 7 different accidents along our route (and I am not exaggerating here) to the airport to the point we were detoured through the tiniest, narrowest back roads which had so many traffic lights which all literally turned red when we approached. The universe, I tell you was not too happy with us that day.
My heart was racing at this point and I was so stressed out that my body was shaking so hard that I could barely focus on driving. If we missed our flight, I would never hear the end of it from my family. And we still needed to get our boarding passes printed at the airport because we were not eligible to check-in online due to the nature of the flight. Ugh! Why was this happening to us?
Luckily, our first flight was a domestic one to Dallas, and not an international one. So even if we made it 30 minutes before departure we should have been fine, right? At least that’s what I kept telling myself as I drove my family to the airport.
We finally made it to the parking garage at the airport, and thank God there were so many empty spots. Not even bothering to go up several floors, I hurried and parked in the first spot. We all jumped out of the van, grabbed our bags, and literally booked it to the entrance of the airport. Good thing I had started running because it helped us get there faster. My legs did not feel the burn!
Fast forward to our landing in Texas. Our layover was only 50 minutes, and after taking in the time to get to the gate, grab our carry-ons, and get off the plane, we had about 10 minutes before our next flight departed. Let the stress begin. Why did our seats have to be towards the back of the plane? The entire trip felt like a marathon. Us running off one plane, across the airport, and to our next plane. Story of our trip.
Thank God (who I cannot thank enough) we made it just in time for boarding onto our flight from Dallas to Sydney. This was the long trek of the flight, and we were so out of breath and super dehydrated. But we made it. Not even getting a second to breathe, it was time to get on the plane. Once we all boarded, we sat at the Dallas airport on the plane for about an hour. Only to find out that the cabin door was not closing properly, and the engineer was working on it. Well there goes our chances of catching our next flight from Sydney to Melbourne where we were told that we would have plenty of time during our 1 hour and 45 minute layover to get off the plane, clear customs, grab our checked bags off the revolving belt, drop our bags off for the next flight, and board our next plane. Boy were they wrong. The delay from leaving Texas messed all that up. Don’t get me wrong. I am glad there are safety measures set in place to ensure everything goes smoothly, but did this really have to be happening to us right now? The universe man. I’m telling you. We must have done something wrong to make it mad.
I have never been so stressed in my life. (Actually, I might have been, but in that moment if felt like the most stressful moment ever).
Once we finally left Texas, I started to wonder if there was something up with our pilot. It felt like we were going so slowly. Slower than we should be. I looked at the speed and I have seen planes fly faster than the speed we were going. It was as if he wanted us to be even more late. Come on dude, I am sure you can faster than this. What are you asleep at the wheel?
As were nearing Australia, more like Sydney, the service manager, I think it was the service manager, came on the speaker and started explaining that due to the delay, we will all most likely miss our next flights. But not to worry, as soon as we got off the plane, cleared customs, and got our bags, we could all go to the transfer desk and get new boarding passes for the next available flight.
Are you kidding me right now?!
My heart is literally beating so hard, I am surprised it hasn’t broken through my rib cage and onto the floor right now. And my brain, throbbing so hard that it probably swelled to twice its size from all the stress I am feeling. And my mouth, completely dry. This was not the condition I needed to be in when going through customs in a foreign country. Trust me customs officer, I have nothing to hide. I am just here to visit family and sightsee, nothing else. If you knew what we just went through, you would understand. I hope.
Eventually, my family and I finally make it to the transfer desk, only to find out that practically all the next few flights from Sydney to Melbourne are fully booked due to the holidays, and the next available flight was 4 hours from our landing time. 4 hours! Why couldn’t this layover time be split evenly across our entire trip, it would not be as hard to pass this much time that way.
I guess looking at the bright side, at least we didn’t have to wait until the next day. Then there was no point of even coming. With our flight landing so late in Melbourne, we missed the first wedding ceremony, and we did not hear the end of it our entire stay in Australia. Family members did not spare a second to constantly remind us how we missed the first ceremony, and how everyone was waiting for us for so long. Practically blaming us for the delay of our landing. And so on. Come on guys! It is not our fault our flight was delayed. It’s not like we did it on purpose.
And don’t even get me started on the condition of our luggage. One bag’s exterior pocket was torn, and another’s zippers were completely gone. Just one more expense we did not need right now.
At least your flight home was better, you say? Nope. Not even close. I felt like we were being forced to prepare for a marathon. On the way back, we made it on time from Melbourne to Sydney. Thank God! Hoping this was a good sign for the remainder of the trip, we took a deep breath. Ready to go home and take a breather from this whirlwind of a trip. We had a comfortable layover time before our flight from Sydney to San Francisco. And the flight was way faster (the plane was going at a much faster speed) getting us from Sydney to San Francisco. But once again, we were faced with the 1 hour and 45-minute layover time in San Francisco. That was not enough time to get off the plane (which was packed full coming back home than going to Australia; the flight was practically empty going to Sydney), clear customs (which if you know US customs, the lines are very long, even if you are a citizen), grab our bags, run to drop them off for our next flight, and board the next plane.
A good chunk of our time was taken up by just trying to get off the plane. We were once again towards the very back, so we had to wait for literally everyone to get off. And it takes forever! Especially for international flights. Now if this was our last stop, I would not have mind as much. But, we had another flight to catch and soon.
We finally managed to get off the plane, and we barely turn the corner before we come to a complete stop. That’s how long the U.S. citizen line was. I thought being a citizen would make the process faster. At least it was faster than the line for non-citizens, but not fast enough for us in our moment of time crunch. You did not want to be in that line if you had a flight to catch very soon. You didn’t want to be in our line either if you had a flight to catch soon.
In high panic mode, I told my family to wait in the line and I walked over to an airport employee or security person. Not sure what his role was, but that is not important. As long as he could help us. I went up to him and told him about our situation. He instructed me to do the mobile passport method to get in faster. To hear more about that process, check out the blog post about customs coming out soon.
It helped a little, and we made it through customs, no problem. Our checked bags on the other hand still did not come out of the plane. The conveyor belt was empty. Come on God! Help us. My eyes constantly looking down at my phone watching the time pass so quickly, and our bags still had not come out on the belt. Shouldn’t they have a policy to get the bags of those that need to get on a connection out first? Or is that not a thing?
When we finally grabbed our bags, we raced across the airport to get to our bag drop spot. Huffing and puffing, a United employee (who was very nice and willing to help us out) asked which airline and guided us in the right direction (which of course, was the opposite way we turned). So, we booked it to Alaska’s bag drop, and this guy we encountered was so rude, and not very helpful at all.
He flat out said, you’re too late. There is nothing I can do. The color literally drained from my face. Now what were we supposed to do. It would have been nice if he could give us more guidance as this was the first time I was in a situation like this. I opened my mouth to ask him, but he just repeated himself. And then added, you have to get on the Blue Train and go to the Alaska Airline desk to get more help.
And off we went running again. I don’t even remember if I thanked him. I probably did because that is the kind of person I am, but still he was not very nice. But I am not going to stoop down to his level. So, with a thanks, off we went finishing our training for a marathon.
We skidded to a stop right in front of the doors for the blue train, and saw it was not hear yet. At this point, we were still freaking out, holding onto a thread of hope that we might make our flight. (Don’t know how we thought that was possible, but one can wish, right?). After what felt like forever, our train came, and we hurried on. Our mouths were so dry at this point, but there was no time to stop and get a drink or use the bathrooms. We would just have to wait until we board the plane.
Running off of the train, we booked it to the Alaska Airlines check-in counter. Of course, there was a line. Come on God! Please help us in this moment. We do not need this to be happening right now.
My mind was all over the place and could not even focus from how stressed out I was. I thought vacations were supposed to help you relax, not add more stress to your life. I was so stressed out that I didn’t even notice that the next available employee was waiting for us to head over to the counter. I have no idea how many times he tried to get our attention before he had started to make his way over to us. But he did not have to come too far because the people behind us told us it was our turn (in a not so polite way, of course). Sorry!
We rushed over to the guy behind the desk, apologizing. Because I felt bad, and then I tried to explain the situation, but coherent sentences were not coming out of my mouth at that moment. And my family didn’t think that they should help me out. They just stood there and watched me struggle. But the guy was very understanding (Alaska Airlines hires wonderful people, except for that bag drop guy we ran into earlier).
He transferred us to the next available flight, checked our bags in, and printed us new boarding passes. Except when he printed mine out, it was not my name, it was someone else’s pass. Which he fixed for us with no problem at all after apologizing. So nice!
Looking at the time of the flight, I realized we did not have much time before this one left. Just great! And we had to re-go through security because we had to leave the airport thanks to that one guy not taking our bags. All his fault. (Probably not. But was kind of stressed out in that moment). Oh, did I mention that the security line was extremely long? No? Well, it was. And because we had food in our carry-on, it took even longer. We would have been completely okay and not in need of a search, if we had cleared customs in-time and were able to board our next flight since the customs agent let us go when we told him we had sweets with us. But, we had to wait for a security person to open our bags, check the sweets, before he let us go. And we had put a lock on one of our carry-on bags just in case it had to get checked-in like on our flight from Dulles to Dallas. The security guy asked me to unlock it for him, and my hands were shaking so bad that I struggled to the point that he took the key and unlocked it himself. Trust me man, I am not hiding anything. If you had any idea what we were going through in the moment, then you would understand why my hands were shaking. It was not because we were hiding anything. It was from all the stress.
Looking at my phone, I noticed it was almost time for our flight to board. After getting the green light from the security guy, off we went, running as fast as we could with our carry-ons in our dehydrated states. Hands on knees, we caught our breaths as we checked out the TV screen telling us that the flight was about to board soon. There was no point in sitting down because right after we got there, they opened the gate to board. I needed water!
Moral of the story? Make sure you have a longer layover between connecting flights when you are going to and from Australia especially if you have multiple stops. You do not want to go through what we went through. Unless you get a thrill out of situations like this, then you can take all of them from me.
I wish you the best of luck on your flight to Australia, and as always, remember to keep laughing, loving, living, and learning.
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