Our journey began with a flight from Minneapolis to JFK airport (NYC) but the story begins when we arrive at JFK. Upon hitting the tarmack we are about 30 minutes ahead of schedule thanks to an incredible tail wind, so it is understandable that we might need to wait for a gate to open before we can de-plane. The captain comes on the PA system to tell us as much, "Ladies and Gentlemen, the gate that we were scheduled to arrive at is not ready for us but it should only be 5 or 10 minutes. I will come back on when I know more. Thank you for your patience." To make a long story short since there is a lot to recap, we heard that same message 3 or 4 more times and sat on the airplane for 2 hours before they drove the plane to the middle of the airfield and drop us off in the rain with our baggage outside getting wet and we boarded buses. Everyone was very upset to say the least.
There are some things that Rachel and I are very comfortable being really cheap with. Hotels/lodging accommodations is high on the list. So after researching hotel prices around the airport and finding that it is very expensive to stay in NYC, we decided to sleep in the airport. The plan was to take a hotel shuttle to a hotel bar, eat and drink for a while until the bar closed, take the shuttle back about 2 or 3 am and sleep at the gate where we would depart from the next day. So the first shuttle we take, in the pouring rain, takes us to a hotel where the bar is closed. What luck. We then proceed to walk to three different hotels where the final one has a bar and the bar is open. We sat and ate soup (because it was $25 for a burger) and drank a $5 Bud Light (WHAT?!?!). At about midnight we took the hotel's shuttle back to the airport where we thought we would go to terminal 1, we could get internet access there, but it was closed and we were told that we could sleep in Terminal 4. Not much sleeping happened that night and ....... this post is getting really boring so I am going to skip to the part eveyone wants to know about, Emirates Air and Dubai. Really quick, at the gate for our flight everyone was discussing their plans for World Cup and what matches they were going to see.
Emirates Air is amazing. I have not had a meal on a flight since I was 10. Emirates would not stop feeding us. Every 2 hours of a 13 hour flight someone came around to give us a drink, snack or meal. Amazing. The plane was really nice and of course there was tv's with every form of entertainment that one could think of except wireless internet access which I thought they would have. Overall very nice.
We did not have very much time at Dubai International Airport, about 1 hour, but it is also very nice. It does look like an airport but it has a lot of shops, restaurants and park like areas. It is nice but it does feel like an airport. I have pictures and I will post them tomorrow. I keep saying that but I have to download them first and just havent had the time. From Dubai we flew to Durban, again on Emirate Air and again it was nice.
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guys, you should have listened to me - hotel shuttle - not a very good idea. 5$ for a domestic beer? not unusual for a hotel or other 'better' (or wanna-be better) bar in a bigger city.
you hoped for free wifi at nyc airport? ahahahahaahahahahaah!!!
and wifi on a plane - some airlines have it, some consider it a security risk still - but I _NEVER_ have heard that any would offer it 'free'. so - would not have been on-the-cheap anyways.
on an international/intercontinental flight other than US-Europe you can expect beverage service at least every two hours. (and you can always go to the back of the plane or wherever set up and get some more)
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