In ten days, my daughter and I board an Air Canada flight to Europe. Air Canada is the airline Canadians love to hate, especially Westerners, but they are one of the better ones when it comes to flying across the Atlantic. Lufthansa squeezes seats to closely together, and KLM's aircraft are so old their CRT TVs show movies in pink and purple. In contrast, Air Canada's 777s have a 110v power outlets in each row, and knee-friendly economy seating.
We could have flown direct to Amsterdam's airport (and then take the 20-minute train to Leiden), but my daughter is coming along on my United points, which meant Air Canada or Lufthansa. (United flies only via Chicago, which is too far out of the way for us.)
My daughter is an art major in university, and is looking forward to seeing the masters in Amsterdam museums.
With the drop in air passengers, I got exactly the flights I wanted: Vancouver - London - Amsterdam, and then on return Dusseldorf - London - Vancouver. After the Open Design Alliance conference in The Netherlands, we'll spend a couple of days in Germany.
But the drop in air passengers screwed up our nice schedule: British Midland (BMI) canceled the London-Amsterdam flight, and United rerouted my daughter London - Frankfurt - Amsterdam on Lufthansa. I got Air Canada to match the change, but Ugh! An extra 4.5 hours in travel time. Darn you, BMI!
Instead arriving at a pleasant 4pm in the afternoon at the hotel in Leiden, Holland, we now will arrive around 9-10pm at night.
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