Date: Thu, June 10, 2010 7:00:58 AM (Italy Time)
Subject: The trip that was never supposed to happen...
Buongiorno,
I'm back in Europe for the first time in 2010, and coincidentally enough (or maybe because that was the cheapest ticket), I flew to Zurich. Zurich was also the destination of my last trip to Europe 11 months ago. First a little bit of history:
My original plan was to work this week. Back in January I had bought a ticket to Sydney, Australia on my birthday weekend (June 5-6), and I had timed the return flight to arrive back in San Francisco Monday morning (7th) at 9 AM, so I could go to work after that. Then my boss asked us to arrange our vacation times for the summer, and I thought why not take the rest of the week off as vacation and book another trip to somewhere else! So I used the voucher money I had from a previously canceled trip and used it to buy a ticket to Stockholm and Copenhagen -- two places I had never been before and also 2 "new" countries. I made all my plans for that trip (even bought the nonrefundable rail ticket), and was really looking forward to it, when a series of events made me change my mind again -- first the volcano erupted in Iceland wreaking havoc on European travel, then British Airways cabin crew went on a strike the week before my trip was to start. So ...
about 10 days ago I canceled my Stockholm-Copenhagen trip and used that money to book THIS trip -- to Zurich, Switzerland!
So this trip is one that was never supposed to happen :)
Then something else happened! My flight was from SFO-JFK-ZRH, but about 10 minutes before boarding was supposed to start for the SFO-JFK flight, the gate agent made an announcement that they were looking for volunteers to give up their seats in exchange for a $300 voucher and a confirmed seat on SFO-Boston flight the same night then a connection to New York next morning. I volunteered to give up my seat, collected my voucher and new boarding pass, then rushed to the Boston flight just as it was boarding!
After reaching Boston, my connection to New York was Delta Airlines, 3 hours later at 10:15am. I did not want to switch terminals (having to go through security etc all over again) so I went to an American Airlines counter in Boston airport and asked if there was anything available on their airline -- my preferred airline. After a bit of searching she came up with a flight was due to depart in 10 minutes and I had to run to that gate too...
I finally got to New York at around 10am or so, and spent the rest of the day in the Flagship lounge there eating more desserts until my Zurich flight was scheduled to depart.
The Zurich plane boarded on time. I was #2 on the upgrade list and the #1 guy got the upgrade and I didn't. But I think that guy had the seat next to mine -- the coveted seat #21B on AA's Boeing 767-300. This is one of the first seats to be reserved by elite members (21H being the other one) since it's exit row and the seat with the most legroom in Economy. I was in 21A in the window, and 21B was left unoccupied during the whole flight! :) What's strange is that no other passengers bothered to move to this seat either (I would've jumped at that opportunity if I were stuck in some middle seat!) So I really had the 2 seats all to myself (plus the extra pillow and blanket) with more legroom than in even business class!
The flight took about an hour to take off (long line of planes heading to runway -- always happens at JFK airport for evening departures). But we made up that time in flight and arrived in Zurich airport only 15 minutes late. The forecast was for rain in Switzerland (this whole week) but aside from a few drops here and there, it was a gorgeous day all day yesterday!
The above was all on June 7 night to June 9 morning. I'll write the "June 9th day" email separately...
So far, everything on this trip was going against the plan and I was loving every minute of it! :)
Ciao,
-me.
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