The Travel Saga Did Not End

But the doves are still among us

Ozzie, preparing to leave the nest for the night after a day of sitting on the eggs.

When I wrote my last post about our Regent cruise to Alaska, we sat, not exactly happily but at least semi-peacefully, in Terminal E of the Vancouver, B.C., airport, dealing with a 12-hour delay in our departure.

Less than three hours before our plane was scheduled to take off, around 8:30 pm, by then 12 hours after we had first arrived at the airport and then had our flight cancelled, and right after we had been kicked out of the wholly inadequate lounge in which we had been waiting because it was closing, I got the notice: our flight had been cancelled. For the second time. Yeah.

American Airlines booked us on the next flight: 6:00 am, but in economy. And the notice said, “You need to get new boarding passes.”

My phone battery was dying. In a significant packing error, I had put the charging cord in a bag, and we had checked everything except for a couple of small, lightweight nylon bags.

Now, by then, we were both about 36 hours with almost no sleep—we never sleep well the night before we travel. And we’d eaten virtually nothing—simply no appetite.

Terminal E was rapidly emptying, there was no help desk available, and I hit the panic button. We did manage to grab a charging cord before the shop closed, but when I tried to get a new boarding pass, I realized that something was wrong—I couldn’t make it work.

Now, here’s the first thing about Terminal E in the Vancouver, B.C., airport: all the flights from this terminal go to the US. In fact, Terminal E is legally in the United States. We pass through US Customs before entering the terminal and are officially welcomed into the US. The signs suddenly change from English/French to English/Spanish.

Here’s the second thing about Terminal E: once a passenger has entered this space, there is only one way out: via an airplane. There are no passenger exit doors back to the main terminal.

We stopped a couple of Canadian Airlines pilots and explained our dilemma. They said, “You’ve got to find an AA agent IMMEDIATELY.”

I had noticed on the departures board one final AA flight out at gate 92. As it turned out, gate 92 was about a 3/4 mile walk from where we were, but, of course, even if we had known that, it would have made no difference.

So this exhausted 76-year-old woman and her even more exhausted 83-year-old husband got to gate 92 just as they were finishing loading the last passengers to their flight. I walked up to the gate agent and said, “We need help,” and handed her our useless boarding passes.

She looked at them, looked at us and immediately grasped the urgency of the situation.

Here’s the information we did NOT have: NO ONE can spend the night, even unwillingly, in Terminal E, AND when the rescheduled flight is the next day, we must retrieve our luggage and then check it in again before the re-booked flight.

She went to work, found our luggage, arranged for it to be sent to the baggage claim area (“You’ll find them at Baggage Claim 35”), printed fresh boarding passes and then motioned to us, along with two other people who seemed to be in a similar situation, to follow her to a doorway behind the desk. There we found a dingy set of stairs. She led us down.

At the bottom, she opened a door and said, “Follow the signs to the exit.”

The other two, much younger than we, and apparently not wishing to be burdened with the slowness of movement we were evidencing, immediately took off, quickly disappearing down the endless, half-lit corridor.

We stumbled along, periodically stopping to rest, and then came upon a large, open area with a few uniformed personnel there. We were waved over and told to get our passports and head to a kiosk.

I looked at the person and begged, “Please, can you help us? We are exhausted and have no idea what is happening.”

Well, what was “happening” is that we had to enter Canada again—remember we had been inside Terminal E, technically in the US. Thus, we had to go through Immigration once more to leave the US and enter Canada. Fortunately, she took pity on us, talked us through the endless questions, printed off the entrance page, walked us to a security guard, and sent us out, pointing toward the baggage claim.

We finally found Baggage Claim 35 in a far, far, dim corner. On our way there, I saw a porter and asked for help. Thanks be to God.

We identified our bags, asked the baggage claim person what we were supposed to do next, and got a “what the **** do I care” shrug of his shoulders in response.

The Porter said, “I will help you,” and quoted us a price. We agreed and followed him and the loaded cart through another maze, into an elevator and then, finally, back into the main terminal space. The Porter carefully pointed out the food court (one place that was still open but would close in a few minutes), the restrooms, and then guided us to a set of seats without armrests.

Gene stayed with the luggage while I followed the Porter to the American Airlines check-in section. He then picked up two smaller luggage carts on which he off-loaded our bags for us to keep by our side.

As we walked, my barely conscious mind noted that some people were finding a way to charge their phones at stands placed about 30 feet apart. I retrieved the newly bought phone cord and tried to figure out where the outlet was. I admit it: I was blinded by fatigue and was, by then, wandering in one of my nightmares where I’m desperately trying to call someone for help, but the phone will not work.

A young man, whom I prefer to call an angel, saw my distress and came to my side, plugging me in after multiple futile attempts at non-working outlets.

Within the next hour, the terminal slowly filled, people stretched out or curled up in every possible space, many on the floor. I tried lying down for a bit, taking three chairs, but my husband was unable even to consider sleep and stayed awake in a chair at my feet. At one point, he got up to walk around. A woman came, took his seat, and refused to budge when he mentioned he had been sitting there.

He, rightly, did not press the point. My 15-30 minutes of sleep were done. At 3:00 am, we gathered our stuff and went to wait in line at the AA check-in point.

We both decided that, even though our new boarding passes indicated we were traveling economy (and trust me, we didn’t even land a “economy+” seat this time around), we would wait in the first class line.

Around 20 minutes later (so much for “check in three hours before an international flight”), a few personnel arrived. We explained our situation to the gate agent, and he listened respectfully, immediately agreeing to our three requests. One, tag our luggage “priority.” Two, give us priority boarding. Three, put us at the front of the line in case a first-class seat opened up.

Then he said, “You need to take your bags to the bag drop. Unfortunately, personnel don’t show up there until 4:00 am. After that, you will need to go through Immigration again. They don’t show up until 4:30 am.”

Yeppers. Anyway, by the time we got through all that, returned to Terminal E, made a badly needed pit stop and arrived at the gate, they were just about to begin the boarding process. As promised, we were called by name for early boarding.

Shortly after we were seated, I got a notice that I had been upgraded to first class. However, there was only one seat, and I insisted that my husband take it. I was beyond myself with worry for him by then. Fortunately, he did not argue with me.

About five hours later, I staggered off the plane, in such bad shape that one of the attendants waiting with a wheelchair took a look at me and said, “Here, you need this.”

I did decline, reaching the end of the walkway by leaning on the wall. My husband grabbed my arm as soon as he saw me, also deeply alarmed. (He told me later I looked like I was 90 years old—I may never forgive him for that one!).

Anyway, we made it home. And the first thing we did was check on Ozzie and Harriet, the doves that have made a post on our patio their summer nesting spot. At the time we left, their first set of chicks had hatched and they were busy feeding them. They are now clearly sitting on their second set, so we missed all the baby bird activity.

Perhaps the next time around.

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A couple of notes about this trip: if you’ve read very much, it will have become evident that we travel with a bit of comfort, including first or business class air as a rule. I am aware this is not the normal travel experience for most. Frankly, since I married my sweet husband, nearly ten years ago now, nothing about my life has been “normal.”

But that is another story for another time. What this story does is remind me that flying is an utterly miserable experience for most people. I’m a relatively petite person, and still barely got into my assigned window seat. Once there, I knew I needed to stay there for the duration—using the toilet would not be an option.

Thank goodness travel takes much less time than it used to. And, despite the relative discomfort, it is also far more accessible and affordable for a far greater number of people than ever before.

Even so, it is a miracle repeated many times daily that so many people can be crowded into such a tiny space for so long with very few incidents: a testament to the power of common courtesy and self-restraint. Once we lose those values, we lose all hope.

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