Last updated on April 2nd, 2021 at 12:29 am
Sometimes things don’t work out quite as expected. Today I’m hosting a party, but beforehand, it involved weeding, buying booze and other household tasks that preoccupied me from getting a blog post done. So here I am, scrambling after the start of the party (well, officially speaking), cranking one out. Et voila—the story of what went down when Sarah and I were trapped in Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris! Enjoy, and tomorrow we’ll get back to our regularly scheduled programming 😊
So we were trapped in Paris, in a manner of speaking. We were trying to get out, but our airline wouldn’t let us. The scheduling of our flight EGS 2074 on Eagles Airlines went like this:
- Originally scheduled as a flight to Naples at 2:40 pm on Sunday, June 5th
- Rescheduled to a 9:00 am flight—we were informed through EMAIL. If we hadn’t checked, we wouldn’t have known and missed our flight. But it wouldn’t have mattered anyway, because it was…
- Rescheduled to a 3:00 pm flight—which SUCKED, because
- We’d woken up at 5 am to make sure we’d get there for 7
- The subway to the airport was down, which sucked because we’d already paid 18€ for tickets
- So instead we paid another 59€ to get there by TAXI, only to discover…
- That we’d been dropped off at the wrong terminal, leaving us to trek 20 minutes to the RIGHT terminal, where we ONLY THEN found out that there was a delay
- So then, we waited 6 HOURS in Charles de Gaulle Terminal 3, aka the “ghetto terminal” (open concept, one overpriced snack bar post-security, birds flying all over the place), and went to the line to check-in, the location of which was only discovered through asked a rep, since no one decided to post the new location on the information board
- Upon checking in, we discover that our flight is NOW delayed to 5:55 pm, which means that:
- we get a free dinner, which involves a sandwich and a drink
- by the time we get to Naples, our only option left will likely be the train to Sorrento, which is rife with pickpockets
- also, that we’d be too exhausted by the time we reach Sorrento after spending 11 HOURS in the stupid airport—one should note that the checkout time from the apartment was 2 PM, which we would’ve done had we known that all of this would go down
- After waiting a while at our boarding gate, we’re informed that our flight is CANCELLED (somewhere around 3:30 pm). Happy day! And what did this mean?
- that the next available flight would be leaving at 10:30 am the next day
- that the airline would put us up overnight at Ibis Hotel, the closest and cheapest option to where we were
- that it would be near impossible for us to visit Pompeii, with half a day left to us in Sorrento, as we needed to catch a train to Rome on Tuesday. We did discuss the possibility of visiting Capri instead
- So after a night of soupy chicken and bland tilapia followed by a morning of croissants, juice and baguettes, we were clean, rested, but still anxious to get the heck out of there.
And so, we leave and return to the airport to and find our desk for enregistrement (check-in). And the sign reads:
10:30 Flight to Naples—ON TIME—Expected to depart at 12:30…
What a way to start a Monday.
Moral: If you need to fly somewhere to do anything with the least bit of importance, DO NOT fly Eagles Airline. One of the workers there even said that they have a reputation for being a horrible airline, and that these mechanical failures happen every couple of weeks. I don’t know who they’re affiliated with, since
- the online receipt read one thing
- the booths, booking passes and lanyards here all read Swissport
- and the company name on the ticket is one that seems to have been bought out by Alitalia decades ago.
If you value your sanity, avoid them like the plague.
