OOPS.
To ensure we would get
to our DELTA 5am flight departure we booked a room at the La Quinta motel in
Essington. For less than the price of simply parking at an airport lot we also were
able to park at the motel for the duration of our trip.
Sounds like a great idea
so far.
The first inkling of our
bumpy ride to St. Lucia was the text Janet received from La Quinta informing us
the parking lot at our motel was under renovation and to park at the Holiday
Inn about a mile away instead and call for a shuttle. Okay, we’ll deal with this
inconvenience.
It gets worse.
At just past midnight we
got a text from DELTA that our 5am is now leaving at 7am. We figured we could still
make a 45-minute connection rather than “explore other flight options”. Then
Janet got a text saying there was a “power outage at the terminal with no confirmed
timeline for restoration.”
We decided to head over
to the airport anyway. The shuttle driver had not heard of the power outage.
Lights out.
Terminal “D” was completely out of service and DELTA, United, Canadian Air and Spirit Airlines were stopped in their tracks. They didn't have power to check in passengers. Passengers kept entering Terminal “D”, but no one was leaving. Except for emergency lights the terminal was dark.
Terminal D was the only terminal effected by the outage. American, wouldn't you know it was running smoothly. We checked the last minute prices on the American flights and they were about $2,000 each! And, DELTA said they would not reimburse us for a change.
A day late.
Finally, a DELTA spokesperson
came out and said it would be best if every DELTA flyer rebook for the next
day. They couldn’t explain why this happened or when it would be rectified.
They gave us a number to call, and Janet was able to get us on the next morning’s
flight. The representative said expenses would be reimbursed and to keep
receipts. We got a room at the airport Marriott at 6:30am. Our trip to the
paradise of St. Lucia was delayed with another night in Philadelphia.
Butterfly Effect.
We were going to fly
into St. Lucia’s Hewanorra International Airport on the south corner of the
island from the Bay Gardens Hotel in Rodney Bay. The hotel is not far from the Sandals
Grande St. Lucian. We like to get in a day or two before our trip to a Sandals
resort. We had stayed at the Bay Gardens Hotel before when we sailed out of St.
Lucia with the now defunct Windjammer Cruises. We were looking forward to a day
of exploring the “old neighborhood.” There’s a treehouse restaurant there we
wanted to revisit, etc. This delay put the kibosh on all that.
Good News.
Last time we visited
St. Lucia, we took a private taxi to Rodney Bay. It’s about 40 miles from the
airport, but this time we paid money to take a ferry. Because we like to get to
a resort destination a day or so earlier than our Sandals stay, the resort won’t
pick us up, so the ferry was a nice way to get to the other side of the island.
Thankfully, Janet had the foresight to purchase trip insurance with the ferry company.
For $20 pp if the flight is delayed you can either get your money back or reschedule.
When we called them on the WhatsApp they had already heard about this delay and
had us booked for the next day. Without the insurance we would not have
refunded our money.
We miss a day at Bay
Gardens, but not a far more expensive day at the Sandals resort.
You don’t need it,
until you need it.
We carry our own travel insurance. We buy a yearly plan with Allianz and the company has worked out great for us and though we are missing out on one day in the beautiful weather of St. Lucia, it should not cost us any hard-earned dollars. Small solace to spend the day looking out at the frenetic traffic on Route 95 and not a beach.
WHY?
We never got a definitive
answer about how this power outage happened, but Janet thinks someone needed to
recharge their phone and unplugged something.
Isn’t traveling fun?
Wish us luck.
Love Janet and greg
© 2024 by Gregory Dunaj
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