Text alert came over at 10:30 last night: flight cancelled. On hold for AA agent for 2 1/2 hours, then working with agent for another hour. Now flying out AA Sunday the 8th at 7:40am, landing in St. Paul, MN at 10:05am, then flying out Delta at 10:51am to land in Orlando at 3pm. Assuming our plane leaving Dallas actually takes off, and assuming it takes off on time, that barely meets the MSP airport's minimum connection time.
We called and since our entire flight is booked through AA, our luggage will transfer to the new plane in MSP - we don't have to get it and re-check it.
Of course if our plane leaves Dallas and is delayed we're screwed on the connection, but booking another flight out of MSP will be easier than trying to get out of Dallas. We're trying to mentally prepare for our Dallas flight getting cancelled again.
Going to drive to a hotel near the airport tonight, and take the shuttle to the airport in the morning from the Parking Spot next to the hotel. If our flight is cancelled we will try standby, barter, whatever we need to do to get on another flight that will actually leave DFW.
It's 1pm. Roads here are still solid ice. About to get going in a minute to clean up, grab some food, and drive to the hotel for check in at 3pm. So far AA agents have been great (when you finally reach them), Disney has been great, Magical Express has been great, Disney florist has been great...everyone has been great in accommodating our changing plans except the weather.
Stopped at Chipotle on the drive to the hotel. Roads are treacherous, and we won't get out again to eat once it's dark.
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| No one was using the patio. Can't think why. |
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| Nom nom nom...knowing it could have been our last meal made it taste better |
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| Chilling (get it?) at the hotel anxiously counting the hours |
Of course by this time it was dark, and the drive to the airport was very scary. There were some ruts in the road where other cars had melted the ice, but they weren't always clear. The bridges were solid sheets of ice with vicious bumps and craters. To top it off, for what little traffic there was, it seemed to be made up mostly of assholes - that's right, I said assholes, who would either tailgate or try to pass on bridges and the other worst parts of the drive. It's a miracle we didn't slide off the road or crash.
We made it to the airport and went to the first ticket agent we saw. Luckily we were in a terminal that was under construction, so while there were two ticket agents, there were no flights departing from that terminal. There was no line, and we didn't have to wade through the 4,000 people who were stuck at the airport in other terminals.
The ticket agent was amazing! We didn't get her name, but we learned she had been working for almost 3 days straight. We told her our re-booking and cancellations story, and our concerns about the MSP airport and connection. She booked us seats on two consecutive flights direct to Orlando that were not showing available online - one at 7:20am and one at 9:30am - if the first one cancelled, we would have seats on the 2nd (if it took off). She gave us boarding passes for the 7:20 flight, and said she would watch the flight status in the morning for us. She was the best!
We made it back to the hotel, feeling better but still anxious. Around 10pm our friends Holly and Brian and their 3 kids made it to the hotel, and Todd drove back to the airport with Brian to see what they could do. Since there were 5 of them, it was harder to get arrangements. They ended up getting booked on a 1pm flight to Tampa, where they would rent a car and drive about an hour to Orlando.
Crazy stuff. Didn't sleep well - constantly expecting to get text alerts about flight cancellations.
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