OUR ALASKAN CRUISE

Part One: It Almost Ended Before It Began

We had dreamed of and planned for this day for months. A cruise to Alaska. Now, the day had come for us to begin this great adventure.

We would fly from Tampa to Atlanta, then Atlanta to Vancouver where we would board our ship. What could go wrong? We were soon to find out!

In preparation for our flights our airline, Delta, was asking us to scan our passport cards onto our reservation. However, for whatever reason we were unable to scan them in. Note, I said passport cards, well that was our first mistake. . There were many more to come. However, we were not worried. We decided we would just arrive early at the airport and let them take of things.

And early we did arrive, like 2:30 am. Off to the Delta counter we went. Wait a minute, there was no one there. Other airlines had representatives staffing their counters but not Delta. We soon discovered they do not begin until 4:30 am. Our flight was at 5:30 am. This was going to be close. Nevertheless, we got in line – we wanted to be first to the counter – and stood there for 2 hours until the counters were staffed.

The counters were finally manned and sure enough we were first in line. We explained our problem to the representative who assured us he would take care of it. Can I have your passports please he said. Did you note what he asked for? A passport. We had passport cards. We had used them a lot in the past to travel between the US and Canada. Well, we gave him what we had and he said in a straight face I’m sorry you can’t use these to travel by air to Canada. He turned them over and read the words we had never noticed only good for land and sea travel between Canada and the US.

We were dumfounded. Barb was in tears. If we couldn’t get to Vancouver there would be no cruise. Our great adventure would be over before it ever began. Wait a minute he said I may have a solution. Well, Okay, whatever it was we were all ears. He suggested we fly into Seattle and then then take ground transportation to Vancouver. Point of fact, he had a non stop to Seattle at 9:08 am that morning that had just two open seats. Game on! We were now booked on the flight to Seattle. Now, we only had to get Celebrity to pick up the new flight.

We soon discovered thought that Celebrity didn’t open until 8 am. A quick call to our travel agent and he was able to give us and emergency number. For all the good it did. They stonewalled us and refused to help us at all. No, they couldn’t change the flights. No, they would not refund our money for the original flights. We were getting no where with them and by this time it was 7 am.

Only one thing to do. We went back to Delta to purchase the tickets ourselves. Up to the counter, we explained what we wanted to do and guess what? When we didn’t show for our scheduled 5:30 am flight Celebrity cancelled that flight, the connecting flight, and the new flight to Seattle that Delta had put us on. Delta wasn’t sure if those two seats were still available. So, they gave us tickets for a flight the following day, and put us on standby for the flight that day.

It was now 8:15 am, the flight was at 9:08 am. We still had to clear TSA and find the gate. Off we went at a brisk walk. Which for the two of us isn’t really that brisk. But we were doing our best. We finally made it to the gate at 8:45 am. The last few passengers were boarding the plan. We looked at the board in front of us, could it be, it indicated two seats remaining and our names were on the board as well.

We went to the check in counter, explained our situation, asked if the seats were still available, and if we could have them. Then we heard those wonderful words last two passengers coming down the jet way.

How to get to Vancouver from Seattle? Who knew. We would figure it our when we arrived. It would end up being a 5 hour bus ride. But we ultimately made it to Vancouver. Our great adventure had been saved. I wish I could say it was smooth sailing from this point on but alas we would do battle with Celebrity again before we actually were on the ship. But that is a story for another day.