For about three weeks the delay’s and cancellations have plagued the airline world here in the states. We were in England when they opened the new Heathrow terminal and the chaos that followed.

My experience with American Airlines has generally been fine, I fly them all the time. However, I had another bad flying experience when headed across the pond. Virgin Atlantic lost our bag and it took nearly a week to get it back. We never had any idea IF and WHEN we would get the bag.

They wouldn’t deliver it to the hotel, so it cost not one, but two cab trips to the airport because the only phone number for Virgin Atlantic is a baggage hotline that gets routed to a call center in India. There are no customer relations phone numbers and we were told to send any concerns to an e-mail address. As of yet, our concerns and bills, which mount (including international phone calls and tips to the concierge) to more than $350, have yet to be returned. I also sent a fax with no response as of this writing.

Oh….my bag arrived with multiple rips in it.

Not a fun arrival in London, but at least we landed safely. Unfortunately, international or domestic, these types of stories seem to only be getting more numerous.

What are some of your travel nightmares and what can be done to remedy this situation?

You are the eyes and ears in this free country. We’ve all heard stories and/or reports that seem one-sided, or unfair. Not from pundits or opinion makers, I am talking about supposed impartial news reports that are really not as such. For example, tonight I am driving home and I hear a report about Sec. State Rice heading to the Middle East to try and restart peace talks. The reporter said the talks had broken off because of “Israeli Incursions,” nothing else was mentioned. No matter where you stand on the issues in the Middle East, you have to agree there’s much more to the story…including the many rocket attacks into Israeli towns. That fact was excluded from the story.

I have been meaning to start this thread for a long time, so why not now. This can’t be speculation, you actually have to cite time, place etc…or just comment on some of the posted complaints. Have Fun.

I have been meaning to post this for a while, but since we have spent some serious time in airports the last 6 months and in specific, the last few weeks, I had to start this post. Sky Harbor here in Phoenix isn’t one of my favorites. First you have to go 30 miles away to get the rental car, or so it seems, then the signage is very inadequate. Plus you’ve got two different sides to pick people up…the place can get real frustrating. San Francisco’s airport has some issues getting to your rental car and Las Vegas has a new car terminal like Phoenix….too far away also. So….I have decided to list my top airports here stateside, we’ll talk about international at a later time. Give me your best, worst, or what you like. Here are my favorites…yeah, I know they are smaller and in no particular order: Sacramento, Tucson, New Orleans, Salt Lake City.

In about a week and a half we’ll likely have a much better idea which two candidates will face off this fall. Super Tuesday includes California this time around and Fox is all over the coverage. This will be the new political opinion thread for now, replacing the ever popular ‘Who do you love?’ So OPINE AWAY!

OK…so while we are toiling around South America for some fantastic stories (in my humble opinion), I am honoring some requests to post a political opinion thread.

Here you can yap about all things politics, specifically elections. We have the caucus in Nevada and some others, super tuesday, etc. I of course won’t give you my opinion, I am undecided at this point.

I will tell you many times politicians, from both parties and all levels, frustrate the heck out of me. So many good leaders now stay out of politics and so many people in politics started that way out of college.

They are removed from the rest of the world. AND as I like to tease my friends in DC…..believe it or not, people live west of the beltway and we even own computers!