Normally, we don't follow the advice of showing up at the airport three hours before an international flight, but having flown out of Dublin before, I remembered that it isn't a stream-lined process. For some bizarre reason, there is "US Preclearance" at the Dublin airport which means we clear customs at the airport. Yes, there are immigration booths and agents there before we head to our gate. I don't know why this happens only in Dublin, but it does. So, despite John's resistance to leaving for the airport at 10 a.m. (when our flight left at 1:15), we did.
And good thing.
I don't even think I can possibly recount the nightmare that the next 48 hours would be, nor do I really want to remember the nightmare that the next 48 hours was, but I'll give a quick outline here.
After we dropped off our rental car and got on the shuttle bus, I wondered what we were going to do with all of our extra time at the airport...until we got to the terminal and saw lines of people outside the terminal at which point someone in the shuttle mentioned that Dublin airport had a power outage.
Turns out, some hacker had caused the airport to lose power, causing all kinds of chaos. Nobody could check in for flights without a computer, and no baggage could be checked. My heart sank. I knew this was going to be a horrible experience, but what could we do but take some deep breaths, get off of the shuttle, and get in "the queue".
Turns out, without a checked bag, we would've been fine going through security and to our gate which is exactly what Glo and Gordon did, but with a checked bag full of board games and Irish goodies, we were stuck in line.
And it's unfortunate that John decided to spin the "which line is moving faster" roulette wheel, because after the third time of jumping out of line, we ended up at the very end of everybody checking in.
Remember that aching back? I wanted to cry.
After 90 minutes of waiting in line, we headed to security...where we waited in a 30 minute line....only to find out that we could have skipped the entire line because we have Global Entry. Maybe they should post a sign somewhere that says that?
We thought we were in the clear until we headed to the pre-clearance area. There was a line at least a half a mile long winding in circles throughout the entire terminal. At different points, gate attendants would walk the line, yelling out a certain flight, and if you were on that flight, you followed them to the front of the line....which was really just the queue for another line.
In the end, our flight was delayed, and it took us almost five hours from the shuttle drop-off to the gate.
We got on the flight, the pilot came on and told us he had a dinner date in Boston with his wife so he was going to make up time, and then came back on and said there was a mechanical issue.
An hour later, we were taken off the flight and shuttled back to the terminal (WHERE WE HAD ORIGINALLY CHECKED OUR BAG) to get an assignment for a hotel that night. We were told that the same flight would be taking off the next day at 4 p.m., but when I checked on the arrival time in Boston, I realized that there would be no flight to Detroit that night.
And John was already missing work.
So while John stood in line at the hotel for our room, I got on Delta chat. The agent on the line couldn't find another flight, but told me to hold on.
Six hours from that point, a flight would be leaving Dublin to Amsterdam on KLM, and from there, we could catch a flight to Detroit. There were seats for all four of us. I took it.
There was a buffet at the hotel for all of us, and we were so happy to have some food. We slept for three hours that night and were back on the shuttle bus at 3 a.m., bound for the airport. Since we were flying to Amsterdam, we didn't have to go through pre-clearance THANK GOODNESS. John pulled out his chanter and got some good practicing in, but he was complaining about being cold. With all of the cute, thoughtful things he does for me, I thought that I would go find him some hot chocolate. I did at Burger King and put in an order for four cups for the four os us. Twenty minutes later, I was still waiting, and our flight was boarding, so I just stepped out of line, empty-handed. No good deed goes unpunished, I guess...at least not on this leg of the journey.
Amsterdam, for even an hour, was a revelation, and talk about seeing myself in those people. Broad shoulders, long arms that protrude from every long-sleeve, smiley. I think I need to go back for a proper visit sometime.
When we finally arrived in Detroit, we discovered that our checked bag didn't make it, we made a claim, and got John to work for afternoon clinic.
We got our bag later that night, but we still have to file the claim to get a refund (as mandated by the EU) for that hellish experience. As Glo told Gordon, "That refund is going back into our honeymoon account!" ;-)
Despite the tragic end, this trip was a delight. In fact, as I sit in my family room in Northville typing it all up and looking back at the photos, it feels like a dream. Was I really just there? Leave it to Gordon to show proof that we, indeed, did all that has been recorded.
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