Bloody RyanAir

Monday, June 27, 2011
Bologna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy
I didn't sleep well during the night. I'm not sure if it was due to jet-lag or being worried about missing my early morning alarm (or maybe both). I got out of bed at 4am to get myself ready and out to catch the bus to the Girona airport (a little north of Barcelona). It was dark when we left and the driver was driving crazy. The sun started to rise and it was pretty in the mountains (but too dark for pictures). The bus got me to the airport at 7:45am and my flight was at 11:50am so I had plenty of time to kill. There really wasn't much of anything at the airport. A couple full flights of Brits were headed back to the UK. Went to the gate for my flight and waited. Eventually someone saw something on the monitor in the hallway so I went to look - flight delayed. . .until 9:40pm!!!! WHAT!?!?! I went back out through security with a bunch of Italians to the RyanAir desk to complain, check on options. We would have to wait two hours before they can assist (apparently part of the law is waiting two hours to see if the flight makes it or not). So I wasted two hours waiting then went back into the long line of people complaining. Some people were able to exchange for tickets to Venice leaving at 3pm, but I just missed the cutoff on that (what kind of pissed me off is that the people in front of me cut as the line slowly progressed and they got tix and I didn't). That meant waiting another 7 hours. . .ugh. I had planned on going to the towns of Desenzano del Garda and Sirmione that are supposed to be very cute along a lake in Italy, but obviously RyanAir f***ed up my travel plans. When you only have one week of holiday to have one of those days be stuck at an airport really sucks. After about another half hour or 45 min we got some meal vouchers, but only for €5 in an airport that charges €2.50 for a bottle of water. I tried to catch up on some sleep and played some games on the iPhone. Time went very slowly but eventually a plane came for us at 9pm. We were all boarded and had to wait an additional 25 min since it wasn't cleared for take-off yet. The Italians kept the spirit jovial though - they were clapping and singing at take-off. By the time we made it to Bologna it was 11pm, then I still had to get into the city. I was glad to see the aerobus was still running and caught that. Got to central station about 11:45pm and went looking for a B&B I found online at the airport. I eventually found it but no one answered the buzzer. I debated just crashing in the train station since it was so late already but got an ok rate from a hotel right across from the train station. At least I was able to get myself cleaned up and a decent sleep (I felt very exhausted by this point). And the hotel had wi-fi so I was able to FaceTime with Marina.

But I hate RyanAir!!!!   :)

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