Erk's 2014 Pacamerican Circle

[erkpod]

Final stop on the forward portion was a bar near a beach.



Another Pee-Pee stop at the bar was a good idea.



After the shop worker gave my fish & chips to some random in my party & then cooked me more, I had time for a quick walk in the water.



Lifeguard tower.



Waiting to return to the port.

 

[erkpod]

I woke up on Thursday to this message around the ship. Uh-oh. I couldn't tell why until Iooked outside then it was clear (unlike the weather)









Some people still had to work, though! This guy & his offsiders were spraying down the deck.

 

[erkpod]

Some people (me included) decided to entertain themselves. I bet Richie Benaud never had a rain delay like this.

 

[erkpod]

I met so many cool people on this cruise from all over the world. There were people from 64 different countries.

Early on, I met two Canadian ladies (at different times) who were wearing Canadian flags as capes. When I saw both of them together, I had to get a photo of us all together. I explained that it was one Canadian sandwich I'd love to be in the middle. That photo is on my camera & probably at least one of the other cameras.





I had my photo taken by so many randoms (usually on their cameras/phones) for no apprant reason.





I was rather tired & emotional at this point at stupid o'clock in the karaoke bar when I took these pics.

 

[erkpod]

Flight report DL1567
MIA - ATL
Friday 31 January

Plane: MD88/90. Tail number unknown. I'm sure it had one.

Captain: Unknown. I know there was one.

CSM: There was one. The DL MD88/90 PA systems are rubbish. I did hear her unusual name but I can't remember it.

Check-in: About 10 minutes. Finally had to hand over some coin for luggage. I did my usual routine but he was clear that DL Gold gets free bags but not VA Gold. (I'm not complaining - I had a good run!)

TSA/Security: Used the priority line (non TSA Pre) again & skipped a lot of people. Free quick back massage.

Lounge: Sky Club near Concourse H. Lounge Angel initially wanted to refuse me access after she asked me if I was travelling internationally today but I said I was only going to go to ATL. She then proceeded to read me T & C but I soon realised that she was quoting the VS T & C & not VA. She read the VA T & C instead, warmily apologised & allowed me entry.

The lounge was busy & I kept hearing of people being delayed due to weather. Not surprised but unaware of details due to sailing the Caribbean for a week & having no internet or TV.

No tarmac views.

Delays: Left the lounge before the boarding time to eat. Got to the gate, found some fellow sailers & found that the flight was initially shown as on time.

There were several announcements & revised ETD. Scheduled departure was 1245. Revised ETD were 1315, 1430, 1600. The stated reasons were a lack of pilots. At several times, they openly said that they didn't know where the crew was. At one stage, they said that the crew were in Miami & in a hotel downtown. That was later revised to say that the crew (a different crew?) were flying in from ATL.

Several passengers had to rebook. Options given were going to the service desk or phoning the company. At one early stage, the call centre wondered why the pax were trying to rebook when the status of the flight was showing as on time. At that stage, the ETD was 1315. The ETD after that went back to 1600 then forward to the time of 1430 which was pretty close to the actual boarding time.

Departure was 2 hours late.

Boarding: Despite the interactions with check-in & the lounge, my boarding pass still showed VA Silver (Gold card was presented) hence no priority on the BP. Headed into the PB lane with BP & VFF SG card in hand & not challenged. As usual, boarding too a while.

I slept most of the flight & arrived into ATL & booked into a hotel, simply glad to be in ATL & not somewhere else like I did last week.

Luggage: Priority luggage & a walk/Plane Train ride meant the luggage was waiting for me.

 

[erkpod]

MIA Sky Club near Concourse H









Don't take the stairs unless you want a great workout.

 

[erkpod]

Ugly skies over MIA



Another DL MD88/90 at MIA



Turning onto the runway at MIA for take off.



Clear skies but a lot colder in ATL than MIA. A lot warmer than this time last week in NYC!

 

[erkpod]

Here was my welcome to Mexico from T Mobile.





Internet charges on the ship were available but of course were expensive (for obvious reasons).

I knew I was close to Miami again when I had 4G service again.

 

[erkpod]

My DL flights MIA - JFK - ATL - MIA have credited correctly. Booked my current hotel via the VA/Agoda site but it did not allow my VFF number to be added. I've sent an email to Agoda to see if it can get added.

 

[erkpod]

Agoda returned my email pretty quickly but said that one has to go through the link to Agoda via the VA website (which I did). They've basically ignored my email so I've repeated my original claim. If the next reply doesn't go well, I'll speak to a human.

 

[erkpod]

Day 32, Atlanta GA
Saturday 01 February

Now the dates & the trip day numbers don't match...

Had an awesome sleep in a hotel room for the first time since leaving NYC on Sunday. Awesome sleep is awesome. I had a sleep-in.

I went to the vending machine on my floor but it didn't like my $5 note. I headed downstairs to the coffee shop & the front desk guy had a good natured sookylala about my lack of shoes. #stayclassyerk

I established comms with Capt Jeff, the Airline Pilot Guy podcast host. He came & picked me up at the hotel. Thanks to an app, I was able to keep a track on his progress which was handy. I hadn't seen the app but it was handy because I was able to go downstairs to meet him when the app said he was 5 minutes away.





Once again I had no steering wheel to play with & we headed to the local train station where we parked the car.



After watching some planes land (the car park was an awesome place to watch planes land), we caught a train downtown.

I've transited Atlanta several times but this was the first time I've been downtown.

We had something to eat at the bottom on the CNN tower & then decided to see if we could do a CNN studio tour. KLOSED. We asked a lady to take our photo in front of the CNN logo which she did. I decided that we should do an airplane pose.



After walking through a park, we arrived at Coke World. KLOSED.

Aquarium. KLOSED.

Westin Peachtree Hotel. KLOSED. Oh wait, it was open. We went up to the 73rd floor for a drink - a must do in Atlanta. Food's expensive but the view is amazing. The drinks were good & the conversation between ourselves & a local couple (the lady loved my accent) was cool too.

I'll be back to do the KLOSED tours tomorrow & hopefully meet up with Jeff again for Brazilian BBQ (he's never been) & then watching the Superbowl
at Hooters across the road.

 

[Atleastonce]

Fromm y experiences with Agoda Erk, you won't get anything from them. I had the same experience as you and no points awarded.

 

[Atleastonce]

Can't wait for the Super Bowl. Taken the day off work to watch it here in Oz.

 

[kevrosmith]

From my experiences with Agoda Erk, you won't get anything from them. I had the same experience as you and no points awarded.

Agree re dealing with Agoda. My first ever booking with Agoda, I missed the field where you are meant to put in your VFF number. Waited the required number of weeks, then put in a retro claim with Velocity. Had to send through the booking confirmation details, waited some more and then still nothing. More phone calls, more waiting and eventually some points came through. Apparently Velocity requests details from Agoda regarding whether the hotel stay went ahead and it doesn't sound like Agoda is very good at responding to those requests.

 

[erkpod]

I have had my most recent DL flight MIA - ATL flight credited within 2 days of the flight. Great stuff!

Agoda - not so great. Their emails have been quick which is a plus. Their second response suggested to me that I should have added the VFF number at the time of booking. Thank you, Captain Obvious! They go on to say that I could cancel the booking, make a new booking & add the number to the new booking. But as they said, the booking has commenced & I'm on a non refundable booking so that won't work. The remaining option (as they mentioned as well as a couple of you did also) is to do a retro claim with VA/VFF. Agoda did point out that they can not add the number at their end at this point.

 

[Hvr]

You're certainly having some interesting adventures there Erkpod.

I am really enjoying your very thorough and informative TR.

 

[gwilli1]

Go Seahawks !

Can't wait for the Super Bowl. Taken the day off work to watch it here in Oz.

 

[erkpod]

Go Seahawks !

I really don't have a team but I've got a soft spot for the 49ers.

 

[serfty]

Can't wait for the Super Bowl. Taken the day off work to watch it here in Oz.

Recording while working today - I did have a ViP invite to Federation Square today but had to give the tix away.

This afternoon will have a total news blackout including AFF. (Was easier ten years ago.)

Been following Broncos all year - had Manning in an FT fantasy league. (FlyerTalk Forums)

---

Thoroughly enjoying the TR.

 

[erkpod]

Day 33, Atlanta GA
Sunday 02 February
Superbowl Sunday



Yesterday's view outside the hotel room was awesome. Today's, albeit earlier, was not. I could hardly see outside the boundry of the hotel.



Eventually I headed downstairs where the flight info screens said that there was no weather available. I can assure you though, there was weather. Very few cancelled or delayed flights, though.





After a train ride downtown, the fog wasn't much better down there. I could not see clearly the top of the Westin hotel where Capt Jeff & I were last night.

That would need to wait...