SKIPPING TO SAVE: The Don’ts of Booking Your Trip
In April 2018, I set out for my return trip to my love, Scotland. It was going to be a shorter trip and more budget tight. So, I decided to only spend a week in Edinburgh. More to come in an upcoming post about the ins and outs of visiting Edinburgh. And all about my travel buddy, Green Ape.
My journey to save a few bucks, nearly cost me my entire trip.
THE PLAN
First off, here is a tip. When booking your flights and looking for some short cuts to save yourself some $, really think it through! I thought it was a brilliant idea to book my flights in chunks to combine them into the best rate. All makes sense. But... here is how it all played out.
Plan - Roughly $800 all together, it was a STEAL! Without this, I was looking at about $1300 without any seat upgrades. I was due to arrive in Edinburgh around 5pm.
Leg 1: Portland to Seattle (round trip booked)
Leg 2: Seattle to Iceland then on to Amsterdam (round trip booked)
Leg 3: Amsterdam to Edinburgh (round trip booked)
THE JOURNEY TO EDINBURGH... OR THE JOURNEY THAT NEVER ENDED
How did I fair?
Leg 1: Starting in Portland, I took a small flight to Seattle. Check. All went according to plan.
Leg 2: Taking off from Seattle and the propeller busted in the middle of lifting off. Scary. They keep us on the plane while a mechanic fixed it. Over 2 hours later, they sent us back into the sky.
Leg 3: Missed my connection to Amsterdam, so the airline automatically re-routed us to another flight heading into Copenhagen Denmark to then connect to another flight to Amsterdam. So, by the time we were about to board for Denmark, I knew I’d miss my connecting flight from Amsterdam to Edinburgh. Because I didn’t book this all under 1 itinerary, the airline was only on the hook to get me to Amsterdam, not to Edinburgh, as this was the final destination they had my itinerary for. TIP: DO NOT BOOK INDIVIDUAL ITINERARIES!!! AND, CHECK WITH YOUR TRAVEL AGENT IF BOOKING THROUGH AN AGENCY. APPARENTLY THEY DO THIS A LOT AND THE TRAVELER GETS STRANDED/LEFT IN A PINCH BECAUSE OF THIS IF DELAYS HAPPEN!!!
Leg 4: Iceland to Copenhagen. Went just fine but was stressed on how I was going to eventually get to Edinburgh. There were no more flights available from Amsterdam to Edinburgh that were direct. Getting off the plan in Copenhagen, I saw a sign for a flight boarding in 40 minutes heading to Aberdeen Scotland! So I rushed to customer service and was able to work with them to get me a seat - but I had to pay another $400 (he gave it to me at a discount vs paying for the full flight fare price).
