Today is the day. It’s 625am and I am ready to go. But, Emily is not. She can always find another chore to do on the way out. Always. And she is so kind as to offer them to me. Thanks. Be right back after I scoop the cat box.
Well, we made the airport on time and early. Being the economical guy I am, I parked my car in the economy parking. For a truly sweet ripoff fee of only $10 per day I am allowed to park in a graveled field. With stripes. Sort of. When it rains it’s a muddy and flooded gravel field. Let’s hope it stays dry.
We had no more than a five minute wait for a shuttle. Record time. Pleasant ride. All the people around us were flying to Hawaii on our plane. I noticed something else, they are all a little older than us. I guess I am in the demographic that goes to Hawaii this time of year. Everyone was quite excited to leave the dreary weather of the Sacramento Valley. Weather in Maui is predicted to be 80 degrees and some light rain. Pleasant sounding.
We met up with our traveling companions in the terminal. All ready to go. And we had a short wait for our in crowded flight. We even have a seat open next to us.
All good things must end. Long flights, this one is 5.5 hours are now ruled by electronic devices. Like it or not. It would be fantastic if they all worked in flight. They don’t. So on my Alaska Air flight to Hawaii I had my usual low expectations. Very low. These expectations are normally met, never exceeded. Today was bullshit. You see, Alaska Air had one of its flight attendants walking the aisle, pre flight, to get us all set up on their app so we can watch TV and Movies! For free!! Right. I did what they said, phone and iPad, and it did not work. No internet access. On either device. One of the attendants said it would not work till we hit 10k feet. I waited. We got there. Was not working. Devices hooked into in flight WiFi but would go no farther. I did the usual. Like, try again, and again, etc. I turned iPad off. And phone. Several times. No workie. One of the flight attendants came by, she said o should turn the device on and off. I said how many times? I’ve done it several. Turn on airplane mode she says and then WiFi. Then it will work. No it won’t. She gave up. Another attendant says delete the app and reinstall. I tried that. BIG mistake. Now the apps are gone and I can’t access the App Store to reinstall. I would blame Alaska Air but my experience on every airline has been crap. What I can blame them for is there attitude pre flight, giving false hope, and their inability during flight to solve the problem. In terms of Yelp, it’s a 1 because Yelp doesn’t have a zero. And this will hit Yelp just to remind them of you offer a service, it needs to be available. I do want to mention one thing, I have a brand new iPhone I used with an incredible amount of free storage. And the phone, being new, works very well. The iPad is a couple years old but also works fine. This is an airline issue. This is my first flight on Alaska Air. I could fly again but it makes me not want to seek them out. I will fly by price, because low price and bad service go together and my low expectations are met. Always. And never exceeded.
I will mention, all in flight personnel eye professional, and helpful, to the extent of their skills. But, management needs to remember, if you advertise something like working internet and free content, we customers raise our expectations to that. Screw it up, and that one thing causes us to think poorly of our entire experience. I guess if I ever again have the (dis)pleasure of flying Alaska, I will call ahead and make someone’s life difficult until they can train me to use their system or convince me to lower my expectations.
Off to something else. We did order food, a sandwich and a cheese plate. Coffee and soda. Coffee was great, and hot enough. Emily ate the sandwich which looked good and she said she enjoyed it quite a bit.
We have two more hours of flight time and I really have nothing to report about. Can’t contact the outside world. Can’t watch and content that is internet based. Done eating. I think I will read a book. Currently reading “Imagine Me Gone”. Not far into it. So far it is confusing but that’s par for the course. A lot of authors confuse up front and then bring it home in the end. I have high expectations.
The approach flight was nice. Great views out the window on a clear day. Will be glad to get off the plane. No telling what’s on the ground when we land.
The airport was a breeze. Ran through it at a good clip. We did slow a bit at the rental car counter. Dollar Rent. Got there after a short walk. 25 people in line in front of us. These guys are old school on rentals. I guess some things are still behind the times.
We did finally get our car. A beautiful Hyundai Elantra. Bee yoo to ful. Really. Ok. Not really. But all or luggage fit in it. Off we go headed toward Lahaina. But first, a stop at Costco for provisions. We are staying in a full service time share so we got a kitchen and washer and everything. So at Costco we got booze and wine and food for whatever. Saves some money. Food costs a shit ton here. So we got a lot of good shit to eat and drink. Then we are off again to Lahaina. This time I mean it. The drive was pleasant with little traffic. We again made a stop at Safeway for more provisions of a type that Costco does not carry. I bought the complete makings for mai Tais, amongst other things. All makes sense.
Ok, now off to the Hyatt on the beach in Lahaina. We drove through Lahaina, finally. A nice small town with high end boutique shopping for the discerning tourist. And very expensive places to eat. Which is why we hit Costco and Safeway. Nice enough.
The Hyatt is actually quite nice. Luxe really. Very well appointed. It seems like a resort but the sign says time share. I really can’t tell the difference. Either way, the rooms are well appointed and very comfortable. The full kitchen is very well stocked and ready to go.
First things first, dropped car with valet and checked in. Up to the room and unpacked our crap. Then the most important thing. Cocktails. I made mai Tais for all. We are in Hawaii you know. So we sat on the veranda and looked at the ocean. And drank mai Tais. Very pleasant. We then drank two bottles of red. Just to be sure. Dinner was a charcuterie plate. I fried a steak as part of the meal. We ate quite well. Personally all the booze flattened my ass. I went to my room and passed out. I slept. But I had leg cramps, prob from the flight, all night. So I was up and down all night. Then I was up very early, two hour time difference working on me.
Not sure what the new day will bring. Read on tomorrow.