Spent a week in Victoria BC to celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary.
Vancouver Island is about the only part of Canada that's OK for riding year round so lotsa bikes
just being used for transport rather than just for fun. Victoria is just plain beautiful and our trip
coinciding with a 1,700 vehicle rod & custom car show was a surprise bonus.
Went out with Air Canada.
Luckily the inevitable Air Canada take-off time delays on the Saskatoon/Vancouver and on the Vancouver/Victoria flights were of equal duration and the cabin staff were only moderately grumpy.
Came back with WestJet.
On time and smiling friendly cabin staff.
But this ain't about the trip. It's about the airlines' modern luggage handling policy.
I purely hate the result of the modern practice of extra-billing for checked luggage.
We paid the extra to check our luggage because the saving ain't worth the hassle.
Everyone else staggers onto the 'plane hauling two maximum volume wheelie-cases
and takes forever lifting them up to the overheads, twisting them this way and that way
to get them in, some even have to remove stuff from one and stuff it in t'other to make them fit.
Meanwhile I'm just stood in line waiting for them to stop pissing about so I can sit down.
Getting off the 'plane is even worse. Every man jack (M/F) of them leaps to their feet
the minute the 'plane stops rolling, grabs their luggage from the overheads and creates
an aisle-long logjam to trap me in my seat until they've all gone away.
Gawd, I hate lineups, especially artificially created ones.
Vancouver Island is about the only part of Canada that's OK for riding year round so lotsa bikes
just being used for transport rather than just for fun. Victoria is just plain beautiful and our trip
coinciding with a 1,700 vehicle rod & custom car show was a surprise bonus.
Went out with Air Canada.
Luckily the inevitable Air Canada take-off time delays on the Saskatoon/Vancouver and on the Vancouver/Victoria flights were of equal duration and the cabin staff were only moderately grumpy.
Came back with WestJet.
On time and smiling friendly cabin staff.
But this ain't about the trip. It's about the airlines' modern luggage handling policy.
I purely hate the result of the modern practice of extra-billing for checked luggage.
We paid the extra to check our luggage because the saving ain't worth the hassle.
Everyone else staggers onto the 'plane hauling two maximum volume wheelie-cases
and takes forever lifting them up to the overheads, twisting them this way and that way
to get them in, some even have to remove stuff from one and stuff it in t'other to make them fit.
Meanwhile I'm just stood in line waiting for them to stop pissing about so I can sit down.
Getting off the 'plane is even worse. Every man jack (M/F) of them leaps to their feet
the minute the 'plane stops rolling, grabs their luggage from the overheads and creates
an aisle-long logjam to trap me in my seat until they've all gone away.
Gawd, I hate lineups, especially artificially created ones.