Let's just preface this by saying at least I did not gamble one penny in Vegas because quite honestly we would have lost a lot. This trip which was supposed to be relaxing and fun has been more stress than I had ever hoped. Now I say this during a moment where I am feeling very frustrated and I need to add that I did have some fun once I got into Vegas. So without further ado, here is my story................................so far.
Rewind to Friday. We have a noon flight on Airtran Airways that is supposed to arrive around 1:50 pm in Atlanta. We have a connecting flight on the same airline that leaves Atlanta at 2:35pm and is supposed to get us into Vegas at 4:10pm. I have a dinner to be at that starts at 8pm, so I have enough time to get settled and get to my dinner with my friends from my weight loss group. So we get to the airport, get settled, and wait to board. We are told that are flight is running late but our connections would be ok. The plane came in a half an hour late pushing us really close to missing our connection, however, we were told to get on the plane anyway, to hurry and get in our seats as fast as we can and that all connections would still be OK. So there we are a plane full of people waiting to take off and we're just sitting there. All passengers had boarded, yet were weren't leaving. A few minutes later, the pilot says we'd be pushing off in just a little bit and that maintenance was on board working on a minor computer glitch. Half an hour later, they say we are ready to take off. It is now a little after one, and our plane is over an hour late taking off. It's supposed to be an almost 2 hour flight which would make us late for the connection, and no one says anything to us about missing or not missing our connecting flights. Well, long story short, the pilots made excellent time, and we actually get off the plane at like 2:35-2:40pm, and we sprint two gates over to try to catch our plane with two other guys who were headed to Vegas as well. The plane was already gone and so we headed to the customer service desk and we were told that we would be booked on the next flight. Ok, no biggie right? Well, the next flight leaves Atlanta at 7pm AND it is over a 4 hour flight. So that basically means we take off at 4pm Vegas time and get there after 8pm. I had to be at a dinner at 8pm and we still had to get off the plane, get our baggage, go to get our rental car and get over to the dinner. We stuck with the two other Vegas guys and tried to see if another airlines had a flight leaving to Vegas earlier. A Delta flight was found and was set to leave Atlanta at 4pm and would get us to Vegas a little after 5pm Vegas time. Unfortunately, Airtran does NOT work with other airlines and the ticket to Vegas on Delta would cost $366 per person PLUS tax. Yikes. If Airtran had a working agreement with Delta, we would have been able to exchange our Airtran ticket for that Delta flight, no charge. So the 7pm flight it was. We did get a $10 meal voucher from Airtran and a $25 off voucher for a future flight. Ironically enough, there was an article in the paper not too long ago that listed airlines that were best at being on time, comfort, etc. and Airtran was best for being on time (at least for our airport). Oh well, not this time and apparently there was a lot of people missing their connecting flights all over because there wasa ton of people at the Airtran customer service desk trying to rebook flights they had missed.
So to answer the question I am sure you are asking at this point, Yes I did make the dinner. We got there about 9:30ish and we had some time since it ended at 11pm. It was nice, the food was good and I got to see my friends, so that was nice.
But stay tuned, because there are more unfortunate events to my Vegas/California trip.
Rewind to Friday. We have a noon flight on Airtran Airways that is supposed to arrive around 1:50 pm in Atlanta. We have a connecting flight on the same airline that leaves Atlanta at 2:35pm and is supposed to get us into Vegas at 4:10pm. I have a dinner to be at that starts at 8pm, so I have enough time to get settled and get to my dinner with my friends from my weight loss group. So we get to the airport, get settled, and wait to board. We are told that are flight is running late but our connections would be ok. The plane came in a half an hour late pushing us really close to missing our connection, however, we were told to get on the plane anyway, to hurry and get in our seats as fast as we can and that all connections would still be OK. So there we are a plane full of people waiting to take off and we're just sitting there. All passengers had boarded, yet were weren't leaving. A few minutes later, the pilot says we'd be pushing off in just a little bit and that maintenance was on board working on a minor computer glitch. Half an hour later, they say we are ready to take off. It is now a little after one, and our plane is over an hour late taking off. It's supposed to be an almost 2 hour flight which would make us late for the connection, and no one says anything to us about missing or not missing our connecting flights. Well, long story short, the pilots made excellent time, and we actually get off the plane at like 2:35-2:40pm, and we sprint two gates over to try to catch our plane with two other guys who were headed to Vegas as well. The plane was already gone and so we headed to the customer service desk and we were told that we would be booked on the next flight. Ok, no biggie right? Well, the next flight leaves Atlanta at 7pm AND it is over a 4 hour flight. So that basically means we take off at 4pm Vegas time and get there after 8pm. I had to be at a dinner at 8pm and we still had to get off the plane, get our baggage, go to get our rental car and get over to the dinner. We stuck with the two other Vegas guys and tried to see if another airlines had a flight leaving to Vegas earlier. A Delta flight was found and was set to leave Atlanta at 4pm and would get us to Vegas a little after 5pm Vegas time. Unfortunately, Airtran does NOT work with other airlines and the ticket to Vegas on Delta would cost $366 per person PLUS tax. Yikes. If Airtran had a working agreement with Delta, we would have been able to exchange our Airtran ticket for that Delta flight, no charge. So the 7pm flight it was. We did get a $10 meal voucher from Airtran and a $25 off voucher for a future flight. Ironically enough, there was an article in the paper not too long ago that listed airlines that were best at being on time, comfort, etc. and Airtran was best for being on time (at least for our airport). Oh well, not this time and apparently there was a lot of people missing their connecting flights all over because there wasa ton of people at the Airtran customer service desk trying to rebook flights they had missed.
So to answer the question I am sure you are asking at this point, Yes I did make the dinner. We got there about 9:30ish and we had some time since it ended at 11pm. It was nice, the food was good and I got to see my friends, so that was nice.
But stay tuned, because there are more unfortunate events to my Vegas/California trip.
No comments:
Post a Comment