travelling indirect

[disneyholic family]

We have only flown indirect once (via New York JFK with Delta), but we are doing it again via Atlanta. Try to choose a transfer airport with frequent flights to Orlando. We missed our flight to Orlando at JFK due to them having closed down all transfer desks at JFK and not operating all immigration desks either. It took us more than 2 hours to clear immigration. By the time we had collected the luggage, cleared customs, dropped the luggage off again (this part was really quick, less than 15 minutes), cleared security (another long hold up) and got to the gate, we just saw our plane take off without us. They rebooked us on the next flight, but that was not until 5 hours later.

The reason why we have chosen Atlanta this year is that this is the hub for Delta. I have heard that the transfer arrangements are really well organized and people who have done it say that it is easy if you have at least 90 minutes. We have 115 minutes. Another advantage is that there are hourly flights between Atlanta and Orlando so if we should miss our connecting flight, we still should be on our way pretty quickly.

Arriving in Orlando on a domestic flight was wonderful. It took us less than 30 minutes from stepping off the plane to stepping into a taxi to the hotel.

Corinna

we usually transfer at JFK without too much trouble...
2 years ago, the cargo door of our 747 wouldn't open....after having everyone wait for almost 2 hours for luggage, they finally told everyone to leave and the luggage would follow us to our destination, wherever that might be (and we should complete the baggage claim form in our final destination)..

so DD and i ran through customs (not a problem without any luggage) and raced for the airline rep on the other side....as you can imagine, there was a rather long line (what with a fully loaded 747 standing in the same line)..

i ran to the front of the line and said we had missed our flight to orlando...
the rep immediately knew who we were...there were only 6 of us continuing on to orlando (DD and me and 2 other sets of travelers)...

the rep told us that we'd missed our flight (duh - we knew that) and that it had been the last flight out of JFK to orlando...
so she'd put us on a delta flight leaving from la guardia....the very last flight out of la guardia to orlando....if we missed that, we'd be staying in NYC over night....
they had a bus waiting for us and the other 4 passengers (a huge bus for the 6 of us)...
we piled into the bus and the bus driver 'raced' through very crowded rush hour traffic to la guardia....he said he wasn't sure we'd make it in time...

we got to la guardia, raced through security (we were pulled aside since our flight was soon)...then raced the rest of the way to the plane....
we were basically huffing and puffing as we boarded....but we made it...
just barely...
not a scenario i want to repeat any time soon..

happy end though...our luggage made the trip on its own, showing up in our room at the wilderness lodge the following afternoon!!...so we only had to go for one day with the clothes on our back...

 

[howlongtillsummer?]

Hmmm

Will try clearing my history and see if that helps.

Talk to you all in five years when I figure out how to do it!!!!!!!!!

 

[howlongtillsummer?]

Wow that was easy!

Lets take a look at those prices now.

Thanks.

 

[howlongtillsummer?]

Still out of the question!! Ugghh.

Never mind - I want July or Aug and they aren't released yet.

Just pricing around!!

Thanks for the tips.