December 18, 2013

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Our trip got off to a less than stellar start for Judy and me. It actually began well, with our limo driver arriving early. So, we were off to the airport with time to spare. BUT then things took a turn for the worse. In checking the departures list we saw that our flight was cancelled. 

 

Never daunted we proceeded to check in at the self-check-in kiosk. The ever-helpful automated terminal told us to see an agent – the old-fashioned human kind – so we took a short walk to speak to the aforementioned human. This human was a very helpful young woman who quickly got us transferred to a WestJet flight to La Guardia airport that was leaving at 4:00 p.m. Our connecting flight to Rio was leaving from the Kennedy Airport but we were advised that we could get to that location with a shuttle bus.

 

We proceeded to check in with WestJet, boarded the flight and arrived at La Guardia by 6:00 p.m. We would actually be arriving at JFK at the same time as our original flight had been scheduled to land. We would soon be off to Rio. 

 

Not so fast intrepid traveler! We did arrive at JFK at 5:30 p.m. And located the next self-check-in kiosk. We entered the required info and printed our boarding passes. Then the Angry Birds began to attack! Our boarding passes in what seemed to be some type of weird android humour had the following notation: “we believe in early arrival, but you are too early. Please come back tomorrow. “. HUH!

 

The woman at the actual boarding station then informed us that we were booked to leave on Wednesday not Tuesday. We produced our original itinerary which clearly indicated that we were to leave Tuesday. The reservation had been changed. Who made that change? Certainly not us nor did it seem like American Airlines had initiated such a change. In fact, I continued to receive updates regarding flight time changes from A/A.

 

So, it was time for plan B. We organized a hotel room and boarded yet another shuttle to check in for the night. Not the outcome we wanted particularly when I continued to get updates that the Rio flight was delayed and in fact, we would have had time to get our luggage on board. #pissed

 

So, as it stands now, we will be leaving Wednesday night to hopefully arrive in time to catch the ship before it leaves at 2:00 p.m. No excursion to sample Rio’s night life and no tour of Rio. The closest we will get to Rio is playing Angry Birds Rio on my smart phone.