Yes I know, it has been more then 2 months since I last posted. But I had a lot on my mind and I wasn’t in the mood to write anything here on my blog. But I finally decided to write the second part of my very eventful trip to NY for Christmas and New Year. Anyway, back to the story.
The next morning after not really sleeping and being very scared to miss my flight I decided to get out of bed around and take a shower hoping that would be refreshing. Which it wasn’t since it was just after 5am. O_o Anyway, I took a shower and packed my stuff in my carry on and switched on the tv and watch some CNN since I still had a few hours to go before heading back to the airport to catch my flight to NY. Around 7am ish I decided that sitting around in my room wasn’t really helping so I took my stuff and went down to the reception to check out and wait for the shuttle bus to the airport.
On my way to the lobby I met a fellow passenger of flight NW253 and as we were waiting we talked about our experiences on the flight and she told me that she was visiting a friend of hers and that we both didn’t want to fly but if we wanted to get to our destination we had to. While talking in Dutch the shuttle bus arrived and we were off to the airport while talking and making small talk with the other people on the shuttle. We got at the airport and went through security and went our seperate ways. Sadly I forgot to exchange contact info with her. Since I was early I walked around and got me a newspaper and a Starbucks mug as souvenirs from Detroit and waited at the gate to board my plane to NY.
The flight wasn’t pleasant and I was eyes everyone that looked suspicious in my eyes, hey excuse me for being paranoid the day after surviving failed terrorist attack. Anyway, the flight went as scheduled and we arrived nicely on time. But then Murhpy decided to visit and I had to walk around JFK with 4 other passengers to find our suitcases which took another 2 extra hours. Yay not only was I 18 hours later in NY but I also had to spend another extra 2 hours to get my suitcase back starting at terminal 4 going to terminal 3 and finally finding it at terminal 2. Yep I shouldn’t have checked in my suitcase the evening before and should have been worried when the dude at the counter didn’t relable my suitcase ensuring me that it wasn’t nescessary even when I asked him about that.
Ana was waiting for me to find my suitcase, she came to pick me up with her mom and younger brother. I finally saw her and we could go to her place since I was staying at her place and my vacation could finally begin. We got at her place after having lunch and I rested a bit before heading off to Times Square. I had bought tickets for Jersey Boys for that evening and I loved the show. I can recommend it to you all reading this, specially if you like music of Frankie Valli or music from that era in general. The next day we went to Atlantic City to spend a day together and walked the boardwalk and enjoyed the nice sunny weather. We went back to NY the next day and had a slow evening. It was nice spending time with my gf. 🙂
Tuesday Ana had to work and I spent a day with my relatives that I have living in NY. A nice family day and it was fun 🙂 Wednesday Ana and me went to see the Christmas tree at Rockafella Center and met up with Suzanne for some Japanese food. 😀 Thursday was New Years Eve and we spent the evening at Applebees. Around 11pm we decided to go outside to get a good spot to see the ball drop and count down. It was raining lightly and it was a bit cold but it was all worth it. The ball drop was a nice experience and I still can’t believe that people actually start standing on Times Square from 11am ish. In the cold O_o
The next morning I packed my stuff and I since I was feeling sick, I spent the rest of the morning and afternoon in bed sleeping. I couldn’t eat and felt feverish. In the afternoon Ana took me to JFK and where I checked in and we enjoyed each other company before I had to board the plane to Detroit where I had to trasfer to catch my flight to Amsterdam. I really didn’t feel like flying with the events a weel earlier still on my mind. Both take offs and landings on the flights back were shitty experiences! Luckily since I wan’t feeling to well I slept through both flights only waking up for landing.
After getting out of the plane and to the baggage claim thinking the trip was over I got another nasty surprise involving my suitcase. Appearantly my suitcase was labled wrongly and I was “Mr. Berger” on a flight from NY to Bergen in Norway! WTF!!! How the hell could my suitcase be wrongly labled after I asked if my luggage would be directly labled to Amsterdam and I got my boarding passes just a few moments before my suitcase was labled! Anyway, after filling out a missing luggage form I went through customs where I was greeted by my parent who were waiting for me and picking me up. We got home and I unpacked my carry on, had some food and went to sleep. Luckily my suitcase was found in Bergen, Norway and a KLM employee called using the number that was on a personal luggage tag that I put on my suitcase when travelling. They said my suitcase was going to be sent back to Amsterdam the next day and that I should have it end of the next day. Which actually did happen the next day and I was finally done with all the crap concerning my travels with Delta/Northwest. I’ve never experienced this kind of suitcase trouble all the years I’ve traveled with different airliners.
Well, eventhough the traveling part of the vacation was total crap I did manage to enjoy my vacation and spend time with my gf and that’s what was important. And ofcourse me still being alive and being able to tell the story of how I experienced flight NW253. Well, this is it concerning my vacation. In my next post the days after coming back and the reality of flight NW253 finally hitting me … and the impact it had and has on me …