air travel from hell

Normally my flights to the west coast of the USA would be direct and on QANTAS, but this time the airfares were extremely expensive so I thought I would take a cheaper fare flying with Air Pacific via Nadi, Fiji, to Los Angeles then onto San Francisco. I knew there were extensive layovers and for the life of me I don't know why I went with it. In hind sight it was awful and terribly frustrating.

I booked with Air pacific as I wanted to earn points on my American Airlines frequent flyer account. I have a shit load with Qantas and in hind sight here too I should have just cashed them babies in. I hold Platinum Status with American Airlines and I thought that since I'm earning points with Air Pacific that all my benefits would also flow through such as checking in via the first class counter and getting access to the Lounges. I still managed to check in at the first class counter as it seems the check in clerk knew just as little about what airlines are under the OneWorld program as I do. When my AAdvantage member number didn't appear on my boarding pass I asked how was I suppose to get access to the lounges. She told me that all I had to do was show them my American Airlines AAdvantage card and I would be let in. Hell No!!! I get there and was promptly refused as even though Qantas holds a major stake in Air Pacific, Air Pacific is not a OneWorld airline. Great so here I am at the airport, Monday August 6th, 3 hours before my flight and now I'm going to have to sit around the concourse bored out of my mind. Half an hour before my flight was due to leave we had not even started boarding the aircraft and a announcement comes across advising that my flight out of Sydney was delayed indefinitely due to the ground mechanics noticing a crack in the tail end of the fuselage. Not only was it indefinite, but if the mechanics and Boeing decided that there was no repair that was safe enough to consider the plan air worthy, then it would be grounded. Thankfully after 2 hours the repair had been assessed and passed Boeing and another hour after that we were taxiing off.

The knock on affect to this was of course we were late arriving and then leaving Nadi, which means I was late arriving into LAX. My original flight from LAX to SFO was and hour and a half late, so I was still able to check in for this. I arrived in SFO 25 hours after first checking in at Sydney. Still wearing the same clothes and so looking forward to getting to the house of my very good friend Will, showering, changing clothes and then heading out to dinner with him and my other good friend Kevin who was in from New York City just for the evening. It was 7pm local time and dinner was at 8pm. I could make it as its only a quick train trip into downtown and then a taxi up the hills. I waited and I waited for my luggage to come off the carousel, but alas mine and about another third of the passengers luggage didn't make it. How does luggage not make your flight when you have checked it it over an hour before the flight departs? The line for baggage service was long and it was now 7.30pm. Another few more delays, such as just missing the train, meant I finally got to Will's place around 9pm. My other boy, little Will, brought me over clothes that he had bought me while he was at the Palm Springs outlet malls only a few weeks earlier. It was nice to have some fresh clothes, but I didn't have time to take advantage of a hot shower to cleanse myself as we had to run off to meet Kevin. i finally arrived at 10pm for my 8pm dinner.