Flights
Going
Returning
2006 2005 2003
Our 2007 Trip to Newfoundland
The Trip to Newfoundland
Great Bend, Kansas
We arrived at the Great Bend Airport a little earlier than we were told. The airline told us that the plane was about five minutes late into Hays. That was no problem. However, they later reported that an oxygen mask had dropped and they couldn't get it back into its compartment. Eventually, they duck taped the door shut and put a sign on that seat saying the seat was out of service. Unfortunately, it took them a while to do this, so the plane was 40 minutes late out of Hays and was 40 minutes late the rest of the run to Great Bend and Kansas City. We arrived at Kansas City at 5:45 which seemed like enough time to catch our flight to Toronto which was only a few gates away in the same terminal.
Kansas City, Missouri
We got to the Air Canada gate at 5:53 and the plane was still there. However, the security people would not check us because the doors had been shut already. They took us to a United representative who confidently told us not to worry as they'd have us on the next flight. Obviously, he didn't have any idea of how hard it is to get a seat to St. John's. There were flights in that direction, so the baggage people whisked the baggage on its way and our bags got to St. John's around noon on Friday (only about 9 hours late). However, the agent tried and tried to find seats to St. John's and finally admitted that I knew more about flying to St. John's than he did. He managed to get us to Chicago and then to Newark and then on Continental Express to St. John's. Meanwhile, US Airways admitted to United/Air Canada that our late arrival was due to a mechanical problem, so US Airways would pay to put us up for the night. They paid the hotel bill and generously threw in a meal chit for $10 each. Then they put us in a hotel where $10 would cover the cost of a sandwich if we didn't have a Coke and didn't leave a tip (both of which we did do). On the bright side, at the hotel, we met an interesting group of black motorcyclists from all over North America. We had a nice visit with some who had come from Nova Scotia on their motorcycles. That evening, I checked on the Air Canada site to see about the flight we had missed. It showed that the plane left KC 5 minutes early and arrived in Toronto 4 minutes early. I'm sure those figures helped the airline's "on-time" average, but it sure didn't help us get to St. John's on time.
Chicago, Illinois
The flights to Chicago and to Newark were pretty uneventful and on time. However, we started the trip with lots of luggage and with tickets purchased in January. After Kansas City, we were travelling only with a little carry-on baggage and with tickets issued that day. To the security people, these are two red flags, so we were chosen for a so-called random secondary security check at each step along the way. That means frisking and a thorough examination of everything we were carrying.
Newark, New Jersey
We had left KC at 8 am and got to Newark by 2 pm. That left 4 hours to connect to a 6 pm flight in Newark. Since we had to change terminals, we were outside security, so I went outside the building to smoke my pipe a bit. We were at the gate well before 6, but the plane wasn't. We pulled away from the gate around 7. Then, we could see emergency vehicles heading out to the runway. Apparently, a plane had made a hard landing, so they had to investigate. As a result, they closed the airport and we sat on the runway for two hours.
