Got a heads up from Scottās Cheap Flights that Scandinavian Air is having a sale through the 26th.
SAS has a nice bid-for-upgrade program as well. Bought up from coach to premium economy (essentially like US domestic first class) for something like $200 per person last year for a transatlantic flight. Was well worth it for the extra space, legroom, and what was a virtually empty premium economy cabin. Starting bids to buy up to lie-flat business class were only ~$500 or so.
There are extensive bidding data points and strategy threads out there on Flyertalk and Reddit.
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So, I tried this and the agent immediately said, āSorry if they are on a different reservation, you have to pick up your bags after the first flight and check them again in Madrid.ā I explained that we had called them up when we bought the tickets and they said they āshouldā be able to do it (we called the Iberia office in the US, fwiw). Didnāt help. She wouldnāt do it.
Interestingly, we were on the flight with another family who also had a three leg journey that was on the same reservation. Iberia still said you have to pick up the bags and re-check them in Madrid.
All I can say after that is IberiaWOAT. Nevertheless, it worked out.
We had 2hrs45 minutes between our flights and it turned out to be just enough. We took off late on our first flight, but arrived on time. We had to wait about 30 min for the bags, but ours did show up. There was a long line to check in, a long train to the international terminal, long security line, even longer passport control line and an additional passport check to get into the gate area. We stopped for 5 min to pick up a snack for the kids and got there 10 min before they started boarding.
Also a couple of days after we left Madrid they found our other bag that was lost. We told them to send it back home. It got delivered to the house just as our uber from the airport pulled up. So my bag left on the trip and came back at the same time as me, but I didnāt have for a single moment of the whole trip.
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yes I forgot that basically all customer-facing customer service positions nowadays are staffed by the absolute worst people, sorry about that, was there no other agent at check in? Jesus christ
Traveling in W Europe in summer is basically the nut low of travel
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The line to check in was absurd. We got there at 415 AM for a 630 AM flight. When we arrived the line to check in was at least 50 people deep and there were no agents at the desk. People were lined up just waiting for them to show up. Three agents got there at about 420 and the they just turned on their computers and sat there until 430 at which time they opened up. By that point there were another 30 people behind us and even more by the time we got to the front. Part of it might have just been them trying to get rid of us so they could move through the line and not have all these people miss the flight. Trying another agent didnāt really seem like an option.
I felt like it might be a blessing in disguise, because if we picked up the bag and then re-checked it, then the risk of it getting lost seemed like it might be slightly less.
Apparently. My last couple of Euro trips have not been in the summer and have been solo (so no checked bags). Those were a walk in the park compared to this.
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Thatās why Iām going to SE Asia next summer! Less tourists there!!
Oh, waitā¦
Fewer tourists!
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I get it thereās a few places that are āmust seeā spots or whatever, but travel is so much better in countries that want you there, where locals are happy to chat you up and donāt view you as some object they have to deal with for 4 months until the tourist season is over. W Europe in summer is literally the worst. And most people think Iām nuts for thinking Pakistan >>> anywhere in the Alps.
This was the problem I had with Croatia.
The people I was dealing with were just shitty human beings. Iāve been quite lucky to not have that experience in any other country.
Most people seem to really love visiting Croatia. Itās almost a stereotypical vacation spot for Czechs in the summer. But it was definitely one of the worst travel experiences Iāve ever had.
Another problem is that itās apparently common for large portions of Western Europe to basically shut down in August for their own vacations. So some things that you might want to experience as a tourist are closed for the holiday period (apparently one of the best places to get a bifana in Lisbon was closed because the owners were away on holiday). Moreover, when all of these people are travelling, it clogs up the airports, train stations, popular tourist attractions, etc.
I canāt speak for Portugal but tourist attractions didnāt close during the summer in Spain. However, if you wanted to go to a low-key tapas bar in a residential area, you might be out of luck. I remember trying to find a quality tapas bar when my family visited me in Barcelona and nearly all of them were shut. Of course, places on main drags would be open because they exist for the tourists.
A compounding effect is that public transport runs on a summer schedule which means fewer trams and buses in major cities. I really wonder if cities do that just to fuck with tourists.
We also visited Spain. In both places all the major tourist attractions were open and they were crowded AF. The closures really only affected a few restaurants that we would have like to have visited. Also a place where we were going to see a flamenco performance. That was less of a problem as there were several alternatives. As Iām not a discerning flamenco consumer, they were all the same as far as I was concerned.
What are some recommendations for countries/regions/cities that fit this description (and examples of places that definitely donāt)?
Yāall are being way harsh on Europe in summer imo. Set your expectations for crowds accordingly and itās not that big of a deal. 9pm sunsets and mild evenings for patio dining can make up for a lot of hassles during the day.
Plus you can always choose to go to less crowded cities, and even Europe at its worst isnāt as crowded as Japan from my experience.
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I mean most of W and S Europe including the Adriatic coast and Greece are just crazy jam packed during summer. Other places that feel similar in Asia are the main parts of Bali, Thai islands during (our) winter, Japan during spring and fall. And for S America, mostly just around M Picchu and the Galapagos, maybe the hits in Patagonia. But the amount of anti-tourist backlash that you might read articles about really seems to be endemic to Europe. And maybe Japan is just too shy to speak up about it.
But as for places where I felt particularly welcomed and people were overtly friendly to tourists, Pakistan and the Philippines immediately jump to the top of my list. Cambodia and non-Bali parts of Indonesia. Myanmar. El Salvador and Nicaragua. The Stans. Lots of Africa. I dunno, most of the world that isnāt W Europe.
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Iām actually in Croatia now, obv the old towns and swimming spots are top notch but it does get pretty same-samey quickly, plus the feeling that youāre getting reamed for everything, especially compared to what Croatians make, really hits home how much everything on the coast is just to maximize on the excess of tourism nowadays. 35ā¬ to walk the walls in Dubrovnik? Give me a fucking break.
I went to Dubrovnik in 2010 and it was all about fleecing tourists even back then.
I just walked on the walls in Lucerne a few weeks ago. Free. And theyāre pretty cool fortifications.
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Japanese are generally chill and welcoming of tourists year round. But the exceptions are Kyoto recently, which is so overrun with tourists that itās interfering with the localsā ability to go about their daily lives; and instances where foreign visitors behave so horribly as to be blatantly disrespectful (much of which also tends to occur in Kyoto, such as hounding the Maiko as they head to work).
But even in these cases, most Japanese are too non-confrontational to actually say anything about it.
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