Best and Worst airports, airlines, travel horrors

[NorthSideSox72]

The Fear of Flying thread made me think of this.

 

Answer one, some or all of the following:

 

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

I'll start...

 

1. Gary-Chicago. 2 gates, parking 50 feet from the door. Best big airport: Denver Int'l.

2. Mumbai Santa Cruz. In the U.S.: LaGuardia.

3. Frontier

4. Delta

5. Chicago-Frankfurt-Mumbai-Pune. 29 hours. 8 hour layover, in the middle of the night, on the cement floor of the domestic terminal of Mumbai Santa Cruz airport, waiting for the last leg.

6. I had a kid puke in the seat next to me in the first hour of a three hour flight. He didn't use the bag. It was an unpleasant rest of the flight.

[Rex Kickass]

1. Flint (FNT) for domestic travel. ORD for international.

2. DTW (Detroit) horrible international experience, EWR comes close. And GRU (Sao Paulo) comes close for no bar after security.

3. Delta

4. Vanguard Air (now extinct)

5. JFK-GRU - 10 hours on the plane, followed by 6 on a bus to Rio. Or, South Bend to NYC on Amtrak (24hrs) followed by JFK-AMS on flight (7hrs) followed by AMS - Berlin on train (5 hours)

6. Lufthansa Berlin-Frankfurt. Extremely bumpy ride, bomb scare at our gate before flight.

[sox4lifeinPA]

1) Allentown (ABE), I never had a problem with Pittsburgh either

2) I hate newark, philly, cincinatti (weird ass terminals), IAH (houston) can be great and suck too.

3) Continental sucks because they have so many delays, but it's nice to get dinner on the plane.

4) see #3

5) Mine was a combination of last thursday (12 hours total travel time from Newark to Houston) and monday (13 hours total travel time from houston to newark) blech.

6) I've been holding off on this story because I need someone to confirm if they've ever seen this before....but....

 

Over the summer miss PA and I were flying philly to houston, I never have to use the restrooms on airplanes, but I did this time. As I'm walking back to the back of the plane lavatory, I notice in row 25 (the last row that juts up against the stewardess's prep kitchen, there are 3 people (1 adult in the aisle seat and 2 kids) completely covered in blankets head to toe. I couldn't believe my eyes. They were completely still, but you could 100% tell they were people.

 

So I do my thing and come back to sit down, and miss pa gets up to go. During our criss crossing, I fail to mention the blanket people. As she tells it, because the airlines are so quick to match all of their interior decoration (blanket color with the seat color) she leans right on the adult's shoulder. She froze up and ran to the bathroom.

 

Later we share our stories as we tried to speculate what the hell was going on. All we remember is that it was really cold on the airplane and one of the stewardesses apologized for the temperature and let us know, unfortunately, that all of the blankets were taken up.

 

I wish I had my camera phone handy.....

 

BIZARRE.

[NUKE_CLEVELAND]

The Fear of Flying thread made me think of this.

 

Answer one, some or all of the following:

 

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

 

I fly on various personal trips about 2-3 times a year.

 

1 & 2. Don't really rate airport quality that much cause I dont do much besides get a snack and read. Prefer smaller airports to large ones though cause there's less walking/riding in between terminals.

 

3. Southwest

 

4. U.S. Air Force

 

5. Baghdad- Rammstien Air Base in Germany - Gander, Newfoundland, Charleston, SC. 4-6 hour layovers in between each stop, no overnight stays anywhere, a 36 hour marathon.

 

6. Flew the above flight on an Air Force cargo plane. ( Most everybody else flew on a contracted airline but since they sent me back a week early with the advance party I had to go with the rest of the baggage ) All the seats were against the side of the plane, faced inward and did not recline at all. It was kind of like riding the "L" except a lot longer. Along with 100 other guys were 5 humvees, 6 cargo pallets and a 5 ton truck. Once we reached altitude most of the guys got out of their seats and just crashed out on the floor. No drinks or meals of any kind served in flight so when we landed somewhere it was like a human wave headed for the snack bar.

 

As for normal airlines they're all about the same to me. I ask for, and almost always get, the window seat I like. I'll watch the takeoff cause I think that's cool then I usually am comatose within 5 minutes. Most flight attendants leave me a pop when they pass out drinks too so I slam that right before de-planing so I don't look like I just woke up as I walk through the terminal.

[CanOfCorn]

The Fear of Flying thread made me think of this.

 

Answer one, some or all of the following:

 

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

Great thread Northside...

 

1. Austin, Providence, Zurich, O'Hare (sentimental reasons), the old Midway (haven't been through the new one yet),

2. ATLANTA! San Jose, Frankfurt, Pasco, Cleveland, Heathrow, LAX, St. Louis

3. American

4. Delta...by far!

5. Rome-Zurich-Chicago-Austin. 24 hours. Went through security 3 TIMES!!! I mean, I'm all for security, but after the first two times, don't ya think we're ok!

6. I have two. First, Austin to Raleigh. I was sitting in the aisle seat on Southwest and we hit some bad weather around Raleigh. And when I say bad, I mean, they had a tornado near Raleigh. And they, um, don't get tornados in Raleigh from what I hear. Anyway, we were circling for an hour in crappy weather, which means turbulance, and since it was nighttime and I couldn't see outside, I was starting to get airsick. Luckily I kept it together.

Second, Chicago to New York LaGuardia. It had rained and rained and rained and rained and rained and rained in New York to where LaGuardia's runways flooded. In fact, it flooded so much and rained so hard that the terminal started to flood. Soooo, my Noon flight turned into a 8 pm flight. We got on the plane and sat for nearly 3 hours on the tarmac. Finally got to LaGuardia at 1 am...hotel at 2 am. THEN, two days later, my flight was cancelled going back to Chicago because of weather...IN CHICAGO!!! Fortunately, I called American and they switched me to a flight out of JFK...in first class.

[AbeFroman]

The Fear of Flying thread made me think of this.

 

Answer one, some or all of the following:

 

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

Best Airports: Munich, O'Hare, Budapest, McCarrarn (Las vegas), Kona

Worst Airports: St. Peterburg and Moscow (its Russia in general), Also Maui is pretty gross given how beautifl the island is

Best Airline: British Airways

Worst Airline: Aeroflot

Longest trip: St. Petersburg to Frankfort to Chicago (16 hours)

Worst experience: Flew to Barcelona in the dead of July. When we landed, there was an ongoing baggage handler strike. It was 100 degrees and the strikers had shut down the AC in the airport. Other airport employees had honored the strike... Nobody was there to clean up, garbage built up everywhere. Whatever employees were there did a terrible job getting the bags of the plane. We stood around in the dirty filthy sticky hot airport for hours waiting for our bags. It was a scene reminscent of the Superdome circa hurrican katrina.

Edited October 19, 2006 by AbeFroman

[SoxFan1]

All I know is that Denver International and O'Hare are 2 fantastic airports.

[CanOfCorn]

All I know is that Denver International and O'Hare are 2 fantastic airports.

 

Denver is a great airport...if you don't have to go to Denver.

 

It's like an hour away from the city...with no traffic.

[RockRaines]

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

This is easy I travel a ton and have VERY strong opinions on this.

 

1. Best Airport. Midway-for chicago. O hare is a nightmare to get to for me. Also Orange County, Denver, White plains-ease of car rental

 

2. Worst airport-no doubt is DFW in dallas. 25 min ride from rental car drop off. Have to tkae busses and trains to and from each gate. Terrible highway system.

 

3. best airline. I fly southwest and united. I like them both. Economy plus is awesome.

 

4. Worst airline. This is a no doubter-delta. Expensive, terrible hubs, lose baggae all the time.

 

5. Longest trip was from chicago to Germany

 

6. Worst travel experience was sitting next to a guy who should have bought 2 seats. He had the armrest up instead and was just leaning his fat ass into me.

[Mplssoxfan]

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

1. Key West or Albuquerque

2. Atlanta or Detroit or Miami

3.

4. AirTran is by far the worst

5. Albuquerque -- L. A. -- Minneapolis

6. I was in a small plane in Costa Rica a year and a half ago. The co-pilot came on and did his pre-flight announcement in Spanish, which I understood about a third of. Most of the rest of the people (all but two, I'm guessing) on the plane understood less than I did. There was about 10 seconds of nervous laughter, than he keyed his mike again and said, "Just kidding", and gave the announcement in English, to the relief of all.

[chimpy2121]

1. Best airport

2. Worst airport

3. Best airline

4. Worst airline

5. Longest air travel excursion

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences.

 

1. O'Hare, Midway, Tallahassee Regional (it's really small, but never had a problem. get there 40 minutes before your flight and you're golden), Charlotte Douglas INTL (it's been great for the many times I've connected through there)

2. No doubt in my mind...Atlanta

3. Southwest, ATA

4. Delta

5. Flying only: to LA. Whole day of traveling: Chicago to Tally. Should have been a 5 hour trip total, but I ended up doing almost 12 hours thanks to Delta.

6. Refer to the second part of #5

Edited October 20, 2006 by chimpy2121

[EvilMonkey]

1. Best airport : I liked the one in Springfield, MO. Like Gary, parking real close, it was clean and new, and had a good barwhile I waited.

 

2. Worst airport: I am gonna say Dallas, since the 4 times I had to fly thru there, my connecting flight was always as far on the other side as you could possibly get, so I had to run a marathon just to reach my flights.

 

3. Best airline

 

4. Worst airline: ATA - see 4 & 5

 

5. Longest air travel excursion: a flight home from Vegas that lasted about forever (on ATA)

 

6. Funniest/best/worst air travel experiences: coming home from Vegas after New Years. Weget to the airport, and our flight is delayed. After about an hour and a half, they tell us that they are going to give our plane to another flight, because their plane is broke and has been broke for the last 4 hours. A new plane will be assigned to us when it arrives in another 30 minutes. So, you have group a, whos planehas been broke for 4+ hours already pissed. Now, you go and piss off group B even more by stealing their plane to give to group A. You have now just doubled the size of pissed off people, real great customer service. So, afterthey do the switch, it really takes about 2 hours for the new plane to arrive. And when it does, theyneed to clean it, get the new crew, etc., so it will be another hour until it is ready to leave.But thekicker is, the plane that arrived was smaller than the one we had, so 50 people wouldn't be making that flight. They tried to bump my wife, but not me, that didn't fly. My temper was getting the best of me and I let them know it(thankfully this was pre-9/11). We FINALLY get on the plane, and they changed seating around, so my wife was now 6 rows behind me, and they had no refreshments at all (really could have gone for a stiff drink right then) and the attendants were very rude. We finally get to Ohare, and it is snowing, hard enough that planes are having trouble getting into and out of the gates. Our gate has a plane that is stuck, but becausethey are all full, we can't use another one. So, we wait on the tarmac. For 2 hours! About half way thru that, some people decided they had to go to the bathroom, and they were told theyhad to sit back down or they could be arrested. Finally, about 40 people enmass got up and went back to the bathroom andtook turns. After eventually getting to a gate, nothing happened to the 40. We got a $100 travel voucher for our troubles with the delays and switches, which I neverused. Also never used ATA again.On the plus side, with all my anger, my fear of flying was nowhere to be found that trip.

[CanOfCorn]

got another funny story:

 

Flying back from Vegas on Southwest. The plane that was going to take us to Austin was delayed out of Phoenix...and it kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed and then the gate attendent informed us that the crew that was on the flight that was going to take us to Austin was over time and couldn't fly anymore, but that they had found another crew that would take us to Austin. They also told us that they had found us a plane to take us to Austin so we didn't have to wait for the one from Phoenix.

 

Well, about 30 minutes go by and the gate attendent gets back on the horn and has this announcement, "Ladies and gentleman on flight xxx to Austin, we have the plane ready but we just found out the crew that is going to take you to Austin is on the delayed flight out of Phoenix."

 

So basically, we STILL had to wait for the Phoenix plane no matter what. By that time, I was just laughing and laughing cuz it was the most ridiculous thing I had ever seen. Anyway, we got home about 5-6 hours late, but the crew was well-rested!!!