I am an idiot. I arrived to the Fort Lauderdale airport last week geared up and excited for my Bahamas Vacation. While checking myself in at the airline’s kiosk, I got a message I had never seen before — “Please see attendant for assistance. Passport may be expired.”
A rapid-fire barrage of thoughts ran through my head. “Expired passport? What? When was the last time I checked it? Oh, no. This could be a problem. A big problem.” Sure enough, it had expired four days earlier. After booking a car, dashing to the rental car agency, driving to Miami, geting passport photos taken, finding the passport agency in downtown Miami, and waiting hot and sweaty in a variety of slow-moving lines, I managed to get my travel documents in order and meet up with the rest of my family in Eleuthera, Bahamas just a few days after I was originally scheduled to arrive.
Even the savviest and most wordly of travelers make stupid blunders from time to time. My experience sparked a conversation over dinner about embarrassing travel mistakes. We are a family of travelers, more accustomed to needing extra pages in our passports than letting them expire, but we had all had our moments. Here are some of my family’s best travel gaffes:
1. Falling asleep at gates and missing planes – Three of the eight of us had done this one. My brother did it at Thanksgiving break in college and missed the whole trip over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house.
2. Leaving something valuable at an out-of-the-way travel destination and having to go back and get it – Two of the eight were guilty of this. My sister-in-law left her purse (and passport) at a remote mountain-top restaurant in Andalucía and had to retrace her route up a precipitous one-lane road in the dead of night to retrieve it.
3. Getting accustomed to what things “should” cost in a foreign currency and then walking away from a great travel memento because it was “too expensive” – Every one of us had done this. We all kicked ourselves when we got back home for not paying the additional $5 to $10 USD in that market in Thailand.
4. Leaving the hotel in a foreign country to wander the streets and not remembering how to get back or knowing how to speak the local language – Again, two of the eight had done this. I went for a long run one morning in Tokyo and ended up completely disoriented. It took me two hours to find my way back to the hotel and I was late for a meeting.
5. Forgetting power differences and blowing out 110v appliances in 220v countries – Four of us had done this; mostly to blow-dryers.
6. Booking hotel arrangements for the wrong date and showing up in the lobby to find no reservation – Five of us were culpable of this transgression. I once arrived to a Sao Paulo hotel in the middle of the night to discover I had made the reservation for the wrong month and the hotel was full. Hassle.
7. Forgetting to put gas in the rental car, even after reminding ourselves ten times to do it – All of us. In fact, I had just done it when I was hustling back to Fort Lauderdale from Miami to make my flight. It was worth every penny of that $5 a gallon gas to make it to Eleuthera though.
What’s your dumbest travel blunder?
I had culled my credit cards in preparation for a trip out of the country. We were so organized that we were able to spend the weekend prior to departure at our ranch. At the Anytime machine, the day before the trip, I found an absence of the most of my cards,”travel- triology”, drivers license, American Express, and debit card. They had all slipped out of the formerly overstretched wallet the grocery store over an hour away!
Luckily, the small town honesty proved to find all cards at the managers office and a friend who has a place near by was still there so that the night before a 5 a.m. departure I wasn’t making a 2 hour + drive.
Use the 3 day rule: Have all items to be packed out and errands run, giving you time to remember ahead what is too late the night before departure!
Check the lock box!
In Greece, lured by the romance of such a lovely spot as Santorini, we waited to get to the plane as long as possible;alas, en route to the airport I realized I did not have my new Palm Pilot, this was years ago, I was not use to including it in my count of “make sure you have ALL of your important belongings” list.
I had not reached far enough BACK in the generously sized lock box! We sent the taxi back, the small hotel, had said item waiting and we were fortunate to grab it prior to boarding the plane!
Note: I learned this counting concept from my mother who had wisely read a children’s book , “Geraldine Belinda, Marybelle Scott” whose train trips alone mandated counting her belongings every time she left her seat!
Watch out for the European FAST trains!
…In Frankfurt, not only did we get on the train to Freiburg going the opposite direction; but, in our haste to re-board, the correct train the bag of my purse was shut in the train door with the strap upon my shoulder! A keen local hit the emergency button, the train braked, the door opened and I boarded with my shoulder in tack.
It was nearly perfect College Reunion, except one of the 5 came a week early! It was my turn to host the 5 Tower roommates, and first time with the spouses. A week out my husband called me at the office to tell me that my friend had found his office number and wondered why I hadn’t met them at the airport!
YIKES later that afternoon I was to be at the airport BUT to pick up my daughter and her now husband, who we were meeting for the first time. This was NOT the time to have one of the 4 couples come much less 5 extra couples! Fortunately, it was the one couple who had made reservations the wrong date and not all, and they were understanding;for the most part made their own fun.
IF U R AN ORGANIZER OF EVEN FRIEND GROUP TRAVEL REQUEST FLIGHTS ETC.
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