If anyone has heard horror stories about European airports lately, here is the real situation
Last edited Wed Oct 5, 2022, 01:55 AM - Edit history (1)
Whatever you may have heard, it's worse.
I had to fly down to Barcelona in Spain yesterday. About a 110 minute flight. My flight was at 6:30, so I got to the airport at 5:00 AM. The lines to check in were already over 1 KM long, and maybe 10% of the counters were manned. I looked for the section that was checking for my flight to Barcelona. There way ONE counter open. The line stretched all the way across two terminals, and I figured there was no way I would make the flight. Luckily, I spied one guy behind a counter next to an unmanned window for Lufthansa VIP flyers (I'm not). I went up to him, and asked the guy if the VIP counter next to him was going to open, and he said he had no idea, but I should show him my ticket/pre-printed boarding pass. He looked it over, and said, ah, what the hell, I can check you in with this if you have your ID handy. I did. I checked in my bag, went over to security, which was very light, since everyone else was still in line to check in. The hundreds of people in line looked at me, wondering what magic I had worked to get checked in like that. If they had asked, I would have told them--I just went up to the guy and asked him a question.
Today, to fly back from Barcelona to Düsseldorf, no such luck. The German airline, a Lufthansa subsidiary, had three different flights going at once to Germany, and all were full. They had three counters open for almost 500 passengers. No quickies this time. I got to the airport at noon for my 2:10 PM flight. Although I had my printed boarding pass, I still had to check in my suitcase. I waited over an hour in line, but finally got my bag checked. This time, at security, there were a large number of women with Hijabs that they wouldn't remove, so security needed extra time for ALL of them. Much as I wanted to buy some water and a sandwich for the flight, there was no time. They had snacks for sale on the plane, but they were horrible. I sprang for a cup of sort-of-hot tea. To add insult to injury, the baggage belt at the Düsseldorf airport was late getting the luggage out. My wife, who had driven to the drop-off/pick-up curb at the airport was over the time limit waiting for me to get out, and we had to pay a $25 overcharge.
Since the train trip to Barcelona from here is about 20 hours, there isn't much of an alternative if you're going down to Spain for work, and have to be back the next day, but travel over here isn't much fun right now. Anyone on their way be forewarned!!
= new reply since forum marked as read
Took longer than expected to get home with stop at pharmacy, so a little slow getting pain meds caught up.
I was booked on the 6:04 AM train down to Paris this morning, and my wife drove me to the airport train station to catch it in plenty of time. Without even announcing anything, 6:04 came and went. Since no notice of a delay had been posted, I looked online to see what, if anything, was posted. Oops, train canceled. They MIGHT have said something over the loudspeaker. OK, so now what? I grabbed a local train laving the airport for Köln, 40 minutes to the south. From there, I got a ticket over to Brussels on a Germany train, connecting with the 10:13 Thalys down to Paris. 90 minutes late, but OK, so I skip lunch.
Well, the German train stops at the Belgian border, and they announce a train strike in Belgium, so we are all SOL. We are told to go to the ticket counter in Aachen. So, 300 people go down to the ticket counter and wait. And Wait. 45 minutes later, some garbled announcement is made, and all the remaining passengers grab everything and run back to the track where our train was parked. The Belgians are letting it in after all! So I ran back, too, and sure enough, it left for Belgium. BUT---it was already late for my connection to Paris. But sometimes they hold trains in such cases. So, we got to Brussels, but sorry, the train for paris had left. When is the next one? In an hour, but it is sold out. Great. the next one with a free seat doesn't leave until 12:43. Do I even bother? But there is one trick left. The 11:13 came in, and I asked one of the train managers if I could hop on. I'd even stand the whole way if I had to. These trains have a few unlisted jump seats at either end pof the cars for emergency overflow passengers. All seats are supposedly reserved, but the people who built them wisely figured there might be exceptional cases, computer double bookings or whatever. The manager I talked to said to sit in the jump seat until the doors closed (it is nonstop from there to Paris), and plead for mercy when the conductor came to look at my ticket. I did, and the conductor did indeed show me (and several others in my situation) mercy. So, now I am in Paris. My first appointment went faster than expected, which is why I can post this. The next three start now. I'm not even going to ask what else can go wrong. I'm sure I'll find out before the day is through!
As for the posts that were deleted--I didn't see any of them. From the comments, it looked like some who doesn't know me or my work schedule took it upon themselves to assume I am some kind of Richard Branson, running around to one kind of luxury meeting or other, being served champagne and chauffeured around from one luxury setting to another. Besides the obvious low probability that such a person would be a regular poster on DU for the last 17 years, I would have thought that some casual inquiry might have been made before jumping on my case. I take public transportation, métro, whatever, and what meals I can manage to squeeze in are usually cold sandwiches on stale bread (not always, fortunately). Some people commute to the same office every day. My offices are a little more spread out, and I usually have to be in a different country every day for work. It's all work related, and you can forget the champagne, too. I have always hated the taste of all alcoholic beverages, and that includes champagne. There are wine and beer fans who consider someone who lives in Europe to be a sin against nature for that reason alone. Give me a fresh-pressed apricot nectar, and THEN you can start to dis me for my exotic tastes. 
I enjoy hearing about your adventures and if I ever needed travel assistance, I hope you'd be my phone-a-friend!
I get lost very easily and I also have little patience when it comes to travel. Also, I need food on a regular basis so delayed/rearranged/canceled flights make me nervous.
Thanks for sharing your experiences!