Brazil to Portugal!

BE WARNED, this gets long and tricky…bottom line - it was rough…

Things started a bit rocky today…They canceled our flights in the middle of the night. We had been rebooked but it was for tomorrow. We got to the main lounge to wait to disembark. We saw Abby and she said if we’d booked flights through NCL they’d help us. I went to the front guest counter to ask. The guy just looked at me kinda funny and pressed a bunch of numbers on the phone but then hung up immediately six or seven times. He then asked the only other crew behind the desk. ‘We don’t do anything about flights,’ he said and brushed me off.

Fine, we will handle it at the airport I guess. We lined up and got off at deck seven around 7:30am. Took the ramp so no lugging of luggage, but then were stopped on the outside bridge to the port authority. Evidently, dogs were there to sniff all the luggage people set out the night before. Since we kept everything with us they finally let us through about 20 minutes later. There was another line but the lady just waved us on so out we went. Strange way to clear customs…

We found the transfer bus but only two other people were on it. Then we waited…and waited…and waited. The port authority wouldn’t release anyone until every color tag luggage was in the port so the dogs could sniff EVERYTHING BEFORE ANYONE ELSE COULD LEAVE. People had flights very early but they wouldn’t let the bus leave until it was full. People trickled in one or two at a time for the next hour and a half. We sat, surrounded by people hacking and coughing, until 9:30 am. Seriously the people sounded like they were dying. Something has been going around the ship that mom and I had been avoiding like…well, the plague. Mom had masks luckily.

When we finally left for the airport the man behind me kept coughing without covering his mouth and grabbing at my head rest. I had to roll my head back and forth to make him let go. It took another 20 minutes of driving. When we finally arrived around 10am, they started telling us every desk number for check-in in the entire airport before they’d let us off. I was not doing well at that point…

Off the bus. I was grabbing our bags when someone knocked me into a metal partition. I rammed my ear so hard I thought it had been cut off. Cue me doing even less well…mom calmed me down. The Lisbon airport is clean but confusing. We were lucky to find the American Airlines counter quickly. Two other couples were there in the same situation. I wanted to ask them some things but we were waved over to another attendant. He was helpful, but it was taking a while and I kept getting more and more stressed. Until finally…tears. How embarrassing.

But, American Airlines employee Tiago came through for us. He got us rebooked to Newark tonight and on to Myrtle Beach tomorrow morning. He actually walked us through the airport, helped us check our bags, checked with the new airlines to make sure mom and I could sit together and made sure we knew where to go. I don’t know what we would have done without him.

We went through security, got something to eat at the Portuguese Pizza Hut and tried to kill time. They have nice waiting areas with footrests. They announced the gate and we got through passport check around 4:15 pm.

At the gate we all had to stand up and queue for an export interview. The person speaking English joked about it being Thanks to American politics. We apologized profusely…our flight leaves at 5:55pm.

After a 7 1/2 hour flight we got rerouted to JFK for to the storms. We landed around 9:15 pm. It took until 11:15 pm for the decision to come through that we HAVE to go back to Newark. A foreign flight cannot simply land wherever it wants. Plus if we were let out here HUNDREDS of people would have to be rebooked and compensated…also no space for the plane, no where to take the luggage, etc. Currently 11:30 and we’ve been refueled. Still waiting. We started out of the gate at midnight for a twenty minute flight back to Newark.

Sat for two and a half hours on the tarmac until it was announced Newark had an additional four hour delay. Because of laws, the crew couldn’t work past a certain time. That time would have been past those allowed hours. So we taxied back to a different gate and waited to be let off the plane. In total, 5 hours on the plane just sitting on the tarmac, no food or drinks and assisted potty breaks.

Finally we were released to a shuttle bus at 2:15am. Into customs at 2:20…freakishly long line for US PASSPORT clearance. Downloaded global entry real quick and maybe saved us a few minutes. Through by 3:15 am. Have to get to terminal 8, trains running slowly at every stop…

Our luck ran out at that point around 4:00 am... The assistants at American Airlines were very cold, saying we were lucky we got rebooked at all since it was ‘weather’. They basically said too bad, so sad, get a damn Uber. My brain is so scrambled I screwed up the Uber request. Our driver, Sekou, was incredible, understanding and even waited and helped us with our luggage when I had to rebook a different driver. The other driver was ok. Check in was pretty simple since our bags were already checked through from Lisbon. Again we were assisted…. We must look pretty rough. I always liked Newark better anyway.

The flight to Myrtle is slightly delayed to 10:25 am instead of 9:00 am. I have no idea what time we will arrive…I think around 12:45 pm? I hope. The crew is in the building doing their checks and should be here soon. This time might work!

Ok!!! In the plane at 10:20 am! If all goes according to plan we will be home in less than two hours! And thanks to Tiago we’ve got economy plus seats from Newark to Myrtle. Oh, the decadence…so much leg room. I wonder if they would let me curl up on the floor to sleep? Probably not…we landed at MYR at 12:20 pm!Read more