Hello and happy Sunday, travel friends, both near and far. Here are some articles we’ve read from other bloggers (and other sources) that we think you may like, so we’re passing them along.
- Living in Florida, we’re well aware that air travel in the state is a mess. That’s usual for summertime due to throngs of people wanting to visit while school is on vacation along with the almost daily thunderstorms affecting flight paths as well as the ability of the ground crews to do their jobs safely. In May, we wrote about how the Dept. of Transportation was working with the airlines to alleviate some of the problems specific to Florida. It’s not helping. Recent articles in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post have put the blame for the country’s air travel misery solely onto Florida. On top of the usual issues, we’re dealing with staffing shortages at the airlines and the Jacksonville Air Traffic Control center, military activity over the Gulf of Mexico and increased rocket launches from Cape Canaveral all limiting the number of flights. With over 1/3 of all domestic flights crossing Florida airspace, this problem isn’t going away anytime soon.
- Southwest Airlines open seating model is unique amongst US carriers. Other airlines charge you for a seat assignment, with the more comfortable seats being more expensive. Instead of that, Southwest charges you for a better place in line when boarding the plane and once there, you can pick any empty seat, similar to when you’re boarding a public bus. Besides getting their pick of seats, the people who board first would really like it if you didn’t sit next to them. There was this somewhat creepy method that might end up backfiring. There’s now a TikTok of a way to convince boarding passengers that the seat next to you isn’t empty.
- We loved our trip to Iceland and can’t wait to go back. I end up spending time reading about other people’s trips to get my waterfalls, volcanoes and puffins fix. Seeing first-timers, like us, talk about how beautiful it is makes me happy but they all go to one place we skipped, Blue Lagoon. I get it, it’s conveniently located near the airport and Instagram is full of pictures in the thermal baths. However, there’s another thermal bath called Secret Lagoon which is located near the Golden Circle. It’s cheaper, less crowded and not filled with recycled water from the nearby thermal power plant.
- Since airlines are graded for leaving and arriving on time, they’ll often play games to help them reach their numbers. The most noticeable one is publishing a boarding time that’s well before the departure time, mainly to make sure passengers are at the gate when the airline is finally ready to board. American Airlines was notorious for starting the boarding process way before the scheduled time, making that early boarding group from your credit card worthless. However, I’ve never seen this trick from United where they moved the flight’s departure time to 30 minutes earlier than what was on the ticket.
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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary
