I often amaze myself by the things that I can do, the situations I can overcome, the difficulties I can deal with and the results I can achieve with a little focus and determination. What amazes me more however, is how ridiculously relaxed and absent-minded I can often be. This relaxed nature arises only in situations in which I feel familiar, and nothing feels more familiar than the repeated torture of air travel.
I booked my flight home, my return to the homeland for a few days of beer guzzling, torrential rain mixed with scorching sun and some leprechaun hugging. It was gonna be great. And it was. I had fun, I meet friends and family, had drinks and good food and basked in the unusally warm April weather. Life was good. Then Monday came around. I was to return to Paris. I casually rechecked my flight details, something was nagging me about the times. But it was as I rememebered, the flight was departing at 9.10pm. I sorted out some banking matters before meeting Naomi and Caroline for a quick drink, then I was off to the airport.
I was a little behind schedule so I took a taxi to the airport to save time. Arrived at 7pm - super, just the two hour window I like to leave myself for all the checking in and security crap that has become part of the hassle of flying. Let me just say now that if we were part of mainland Europe, I would absolutely prefer the train. Anyway back to the airport. I walk up to the automated check-in machine in the Aer Lingus departure area, these machines are just so cool! So I key in my flight code and a message flashes up ''your flight has departed - please contact the helpdesk''. I was a little drunk I must confess, I'd had two pints before I left city centre and so I giggled slightly, thinking the machine had made an error. It happens all the time after all. I walked over to another machine. I entered the code again. Same message. Slightly more sober now. Maybe I should check the departure screen in the main entrance? I run over and there it is...or rather there it isn't - the flight has flown. Oh nuts... I pull out my flight details, it definately said 9.10pm. I open it - I was right! Oh no, wait, 9.10pm is the arrival time...bugger
So there I was. Standing in the middle of Dublin Airport, no flight to catch, nowhere to go and soon to be stung for the price of a new flight. Oddly enough I was delighted(perhaps the beer played a large part of this?). I hopped on a bus and headed back to college to try and book another flight online. When I got there a terrible realisation hit me - with so little time to book a return flight I would have to keep costs down and fly with...Ryanair. Christ! So I did it. I booked my flight with them, gave myself 2 extra days in Ireland and headed West the next morning to visit the family for one night. So this was the silver lining, getting a few days extra at home. Sweet.
But all too soon the time was up and I found myself back on the train to Dublin and from there, the bus to the airport. Just as we climbed the ramp to the Arrivals entrance at the airport I pulled out my booking reference and a wave of nausea hit me. It was Ryanair. I had no bags to check in. This meant I had to check in online. The time to do so had passed two hours previously. Aha, Ryanair had not finished with me yet. Up to the checkout desk and I was unhelpfully redirected to the ''helpdesk'' (i wonder how long before the staff will be instructed to spit on passengers?!). Here I paid my ''fine'' of €20 because Ryanair doesn't operate like normal airlines. I bit my tongue, coughed up the cash and dragged what was left of my tattered wallet and my will to live to the departure lounge. All went swimmingly from this point; I even enjoyed a refreshing walk/hike to Pier D to catch the plane, then back again to the main terminal to the NEAREST atm to get money for the bus from Beauvais to Paris. We boarded the flight without any problems and I was delighted to find that the seats were standard - no more extra costs! My poor debit card couldn't take much more. The one way flight had now cost me more than my original return flight AND I had been downgraded to Ryanair. What luck eh?
Needless to say, I will be extremely vigilant with my flight details from now on and I pray this will never happen again. I would sell my soul to avoid ever flying with Ryanair again but I've been making that wish for years now.
Oh Well, as the French say, C'est la vie!! :D
**In my defence, Ryanair typically email you to remind you to check in online 5 days before you fly out. I believe they've extended this to 15 days or something now but there's so much fine print that its hard to know where you stand with them. Either way I received an email with my booking reference only (which I printed), I did NOT receive an email to remind me to log in online. Surely this is a disgrace. I'd complain but Ryanair actually don't have a complaints department. It doesn't exist. Seriously. Anyway, that's the end of my rant. For now..........
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