Your travel mishaps? (camping, hotels, Cuba, airlines)

[GeoffD]

I was in a train wreck going from Santiago Chile to Chillan for a summer ski trip. A truck carrying grain got T-boned at a rail crossing. The truck was destroyed. The nose of the locomotive was a mess. There was grain and dust everywhere that looked like smoke. Another train showed up an hour later and I transferred over.

Another Chile trip, we were snowed in for 4 extra days at Valle Nevado. Fortunately, there were plenty of empty seats on flights to the US at that time of year so I had no problem getting home.

I got stuck in Paris for a week due to an air traffic controller strike. Air France put me up in a nice hotel in Montparnasse where they put flight crews. After a week, I got bused to Brussels.

I was at a Heathrow airport hotel once with a business meeting at some AT&T building in Malmesbury that had showed up on my schedule at the last minute. After breakfast, I wandered over to the concierge to figure out how to get to Malmesbury assuming it was near London. After a bunch of messing around with maps, I learned it was almost 2 hours west of Heathrow in the boonies. I rented a car and drove fast out the M4. I got hung up by sheep in the secondary roads a couple of times but was only a few minutes late to my appointment.

I was bringing a bunch of equipment into Paris to bring to a test lab to get French approvals. I loaded everything on a baggage cart at CDG and was stopped by immigration/customs. It was a weekend and Monday was a bank holiday. I had to be at a lab at 8:00 Tuesday morning. They wanted to impound all the equipment until Tuesday. I told them that if I wasn’t in Brittany on Tuesday morning with this equipment, I’d get fired. Their response was “We didn’t see you.” I pushed my baggage cart off to the rental car bus.

I drove from DEN to Aspen once in a rental GEO Metro in a foot of unplowed snow when my connecting flight to Aspen canceled. It was pretty dodgy with the little rental car bottoming out climbing the passes on I-70 with my foot to the floor the whole way. I was right at the limits of my winter driving skills.

I’ve had to change flights on the fly a bunch of times. I’ve only been stranded twice. Once in Chicago on Dec 26th after the shoe bomber thing delayed security for my flight into O’Hare by hours. United got me an airport hotel at their rate so it was only a $100-ish overnight delay. I missed a connection to Chile in Miami once and got delayed 24 hours. American paid the hotel. We rented a car and drove around south Florida the next day.

After a red eye to London and working all day, I half woke in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and woke up in the hotel corridor in my underwear locked out of my room. I had to go to the front desk and get another key. It was a small Indian-run hotel that knew us. At breakfast the next morning, all my co-workers knew about it.

[Jean-Francois]

I arrived at London Stansted Airport to check-in for an Air Berlin flight to Dortmund.
The check-in agent asked for my passport, and I placed it on the counter, she said, “That close cut salt and pepper look you have suits you now, but I prefer the shoulder length auburn look in your photo.”
I’d grabbed my wife’s passport in my hurry to catch the Stansted Express train to the airport.
Fortunately we only live just shy of 40 miles from the airport, and it’s Motorway, (like Interstate) almost all the way, so my wife made it with my passport in plenty of time.

[RMESMH]

Originally Posted by sam812

I did have one kinda scary event. Flew from Minneapolis to Amsterdam. Flights don't fly straight across the ocean. You fly way up north and then fly south into Amsterdam. At real close to the northern most point everyone was talking, watching a movie, or listening to music. Then the entire cabin went completely black with nothing working. The plane went from a dull roar to being able to hear a pin drop. It stayed black for maybe 2 minutes then the lights came back on. After another 10-15 minutes the TVs started working again, kinda, they would just randomly go black of change the channel by itself. It never did work correctly on the 3 or 4 hours we had left.

The great thing is the plane itself stayed working perfectly.

I was on the Oregon coast a couple years ago. On the way home in mid April I got snowed in for 3 days 100 miles from home on a near 2000 mile trip.

We had a mishap as the plane was slowly moving along on the runway that turned into a benefit for me and my traveling companion.

We were flying from LAX to London in the mid 1980s.

We wanted to fly directly onto the continent to start our Eurail passes right away, but flying into London (Gatwick) was much, much cheaper (we were going to take a bus to Dover and then the Ferry to France}. While moseying along on the runway before takeoff, one the engines went on the fritz. The plane went back to the gate, we got off, and the flight ended up being canceled, and this was at night. This was a British Airways flight. For those of us who wanted to (we did, and it worked out well for us) British Airways put us on the next Air France flight to Paris in seats that were in a cabin above coach (Business Class, IIRC).

[saibot]

I was not the one traveling on this occasion, but I was in on the action. My brother-in-law and two young children were flying from New York to Munich. I was staying with my sister-in-law, and she was watching the online flight tracker every so often. All of a sudden I heard her shriek in terror. The plane icon had gotten as far north as the US/Canada border, and then slowly made a U-turn and headed back south. She was immediately convinced the plane had been hijacked by terrorists with her entire family aboard, and it was all I could do to keep her calm. To tell the truth, I was a bit concerned myself.

The story, as we heard it a couple of hours later from my brother-in-law over the phone, was that everything had been going just fine, when all of a sudden the smell of smoke permeated the cabin and the flight attendants started rushing around. After a few tense minutes, the pilot came on the loudspeaker and announced that a coffee maker had malfunctioned and started sparking. It didn't seem too serious, but out of an abundance of caution, they were heading back to the nearest major airport, Boston, to get things checked out.

The upshot was that my brother-in-law and the kids were put up in a nice hotel (it had been an evening flight) and got to spend most of the next day checking out Boston, and my sister-in-law took two Tylenol and lay down in a dark room for a long time.

MoneyGram system down for 2 WEEKS!? in Malaysia when I kind of had to pick up $700 USD from that account=3,000/3,100 Malaysian Ringgit. Had to use International Debit Card/Cash in my bookbag instead for more than 5 days total. Oops, if I only had the cash funds on MoneyGram. Having to switch the $700 USD MoneyGram right into Western Union.

Got mugged in Jordan. Very light. A young child only took 85 USD/60 Jordinian Dinars from my left hand lightning fast. Didn't even push me, or take my Passport that was just below the cash funds. The first 17 to 19 days of Jordan felt extremely safe. The crime rate is still quite low over there/not sketchy or ever dangerous.

Missed up to 4 airplane flights in recent years. Two before and after South Korea, 1 in Turkey to USA, and 1 from India to Malaysia. Arrived 2 to 3 hours early for each flight! For now on, going to the airport 5 to 7 hours early minimal. Or even 10 to 17 hours overnight. Have to ask directly the airport reception agents of exact similar flight path routes if I ever need a Transit Visa!, or any other extra Virus prerequisite rules!

Izmir Turkey foreign currency exchange wanting to take $300 USD out of $500 USD, to give me only $200=3,274 Liras instead of 8,185 of it. -5,000 TL deducted!? Decided to go on a 10 hours+ bus ride to Istanbul with officially receiving at much cheaper prices. Saved hundreds. DID return back to Izmir.

Grateful almost absolutely every second that I am at least International Traveling. So, still not complaining. Just extremely happy to enter overseas.

However, really hope to minimize any stumbling blocks for now on. Never my own fault.

[lieqiang]

Originally Posted by GeoffD

I got hung up by sheep in the secondary roads a couple of times but was only a few minutes late to my appointment.

Heh heh. I like this.

[TRosa]

Back in February of this year during my trip in Ecuador; while lying in bed, talking on the phone, I was horrified to see a small snake making it's way through the ceiling. I didn't get a moment's rest after that and was out of there first thing in the morning. This assured me, even though I wasn't in the amazon, I won't ever be in the Amazon, except of course in membership with amazon .com. For some reason though, I camp and never freaked out when seeing a snake in a tree; something about when they visit in the comfort of the casa you are living in. .

Oh and there was the hurricane, while I was visiting Mexico a couple of years ago. I was staying beachfront and it wasn't a good experience. We gathered in and area and all were pretty terrified as water flooded the area and anytime one tried to venture out to get to a different area, it wasn't an experience one would want to deal with again if possible to avoid.

[arr430]

Rode out a full-force typhoon in Philippines, just sat there in the dark and listened to wind blow, many roofs blown off or worse, but I just had broken windows and horizontal rain. City without lights for 15 days, no place to charge phones, internet down 40 days. Surprisingly, I never felt any fear.

Miraculously, I was neveer robbed, although at first, I carried money like an idiot -- now I sleep wearing my money belt.

Waiting in Bujumbura for the ferry to Zaire, I set my shoulder bag down, and someone grabbed it. Bystanders gave chase, the bag was dropped and recovered. Since then, I stand on the strap -- it's all a learning process.

Arrrived in Annaba, Algeria at night, no foreign exchange, every hotel full, some international conference. The police were preparing a holding cell for me, when a hotel was found with a single guy in a double room, who shared with me.

About the Amman story, I was in an Amman police staion once and I asked the chief abut a chalkboard stats in Arabic. The whole precinct had only a couple of thefts per month. Nobody steals anything in Jordan.

[slduvall]

Originally Posted by Monello

I was a wee bit rudderless in my late teens. A local guy would regale us with tales of his adventures overseas doing some government work. He highly encouraged I seek similar employment opportunities. I figured what they heck, might as well. If I don't like it, I can tell them to **** up a rope.

They required a mental test and a physical. I aced them both. They got me a free airline ticket to their crash course for all new employees. I was told basically to pay attention to the training, not say much and under no circumstances draw any attention to myself. I found that advice a bit odd, but I rolled with the punches, as they say.

The plane lands then everything become a blur. I should have written BLUR. Next thing I know multiple people are screaming at me. They are maligning my intelligence when my test scores showed I was quite capable for the challenge. Then the hazing began. I was held down in a chair while my head was shaved. I was given various article of clothing to wear. All the clothes were either too big or super small. They forced us to make our beds to some NASA requirement degree of accuracy. After a few hours of this torture, they let all of the new trainees sleep.

After our beds barely warmed from our body heat, some clod comes screeching in the room banging a metal trash can on the floor while simultaneously slamming the metallic lid on the abused trash can. We are forced marched and fed food items of uncertain origin. I don't recall exactly what I ate. I vaguely remember items such as mystery meat, cream of lump soup, brown surprise and S&*T on a shingle. They had us do exercises until the walls of our exercise den dripped with condensation. Next stop they tortured us with a noxious vapor that caused our noses to run uncontrollably while stinging our eye sockets as if we were jabbed with red hot pokers.

We eventually accepted our fate and situation. After a few weeks it ended. They gave us clothes that fit and sent us packing for parts unknown. As luck would have it, I got packed off to Italy. By the time I stopped working for them, I had traveled to 45 different countries. Each nation I visited made me appreciate the fact that I was fortunate to have been born in America.

This occurred over 40 years ago. Even today they show their appreciation for my efforts by sending me a check every month.

I was on this same trip, but as a girl didn't get shaved! Still get the check too!

[slduvall]

One trip to Eygpt on a Nile tour circa '98

- lost my luggage (found in a drunk Brits room after two days)

- bus breaks down at one stop, they have us get out and push start

- take a carriage ride, horse craps out, they have us get out and walk up a hill (still feel guilty about that)

- take a felucca ride on the Aswan (kind of a sail boat) rudder or something breaks , we get towed to shore.

Started to get leery about transportation in Eygpt -

- take a small boat out to the Temple of Isis - yep motor died, we are literally paddling, but laughing so hard the guy thinks we are nuts.

- the only transportation that worked was a camel.

We were the only ones on the cruise that didn't get Amun Ra's revenge, we were traveling with a dr and didn't eat anything raw...ever...had to be cooked and steaming!

We were kinda scared to get back on the plane, almost made it, till a dumbass woman who was allergic to everything and had eaten at locals house got deathly ill. Plane was bound for London, but we stopped in Paris. Our friend was the only Doc on board, so he took care of her till we landed.