Before I travel anywhere I always have a reoccurring nightmare. I dream that my airplane is leaving in an hour, and I'm still in my pajamas, and I haven't packed yet. Shear panic. In this nightmare, everything goes in super slow motion, except time.
Our trip to Calgary went down like a real life nightmare. It was the vacation that almost wasn't, due to one stupid error.
Jonathan and I recently renewed our passports. As part of the renewal we got the fancy new passport cards which can be used when traveling in Canada, the Bahamas, Mexico and the like. How convenient? We failed to read the fine print ... by land or sea -- not air!
When traveling by air into Canada you need a good old fashioned passport... ugh! And when did we figure this out? At the check in counter two hours before our flight. In fact I flashed back to a moment earlier that day when I looked at Jonathan and my passports sitting on the desk, and thought... maybe, just maybe I should pack these.
But no such luck. The accommodating WestJet staff took pity on us and extended the check in cutoff time by fifteen minutes, from 1 pm to 1:15 pm. ... if Jonathan could make it back from San Jose with the passports by 1:15 pm (our flight was at 2 pm), they would get us and our bags on the flight.
That was a big if. Now to put it into context, even on a Holiday, it usually takes 45 to 50 minutes to get to San Jose. Realistically we were looking at Jonathan arriving back at the airport at 1:30 pm. To complicate matters, our house keys were with the valet in long term parking. Jonathan not only had to get our passports in no time flat, but he also had to figure out how to break into our house.
To add more drama to an already tense situation, WestJet has only has one flight a day to Calgary, our vacation was very short, and one day lost would have put a damper on the entire Holiday.
Jonathan sprinted for a cab.
I sat with the boys within eye and earshot of the WestJet counter. I would get periodic updates from Jonathan, and relay it to the West Jet staff, while the minutes counted down on the clock.
First off, the cabby pulled off a miracle, traveling at 80 miles an hour the whole way. And Jonathan figured out how to get in the house, without breaking a window -- and the house was far more secure because of it.
At the 1:15 pm deadline Jonathan alerted me that he was pulling into the airport, and just needed to pay the cabby. I told the WestJet staff, who started checking in the boys (we had their passports), and our luggage so the porter could run it to the airplane.
Once we were checked in, the attendant escorted us through security at a run, and ensured that we made it safely on the airplane.
We just got back from an amazing four day trip to Calgary and Banff --thanks to the amazing efforts of of a cabby, and the understanding staff at WestJet. In contrast to some of our recent bad, family-unfriendly air travel experiences, this level of customer service was truly exceptional. It was our first time on WestJet, and definitely not our last.
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