Oh HOLY lord!
If only y'all knew the pain.
THE PAIN.
*We have made it to the states safe and sound. So now I can include dates!
Okay. So SATO booked our travels: Our flights (there were three flights) and our overnight stay in Baltimore. By no means is any of the below their fault, BUT SATO comes into play later...
We were booked to fly from Ramstein to Baltimore, MD on August 8th at 5pm.
Once in Baltimore, we were set to stay overnight at an airport hotel, catch a flight to Chicago at 11am on August 9th, and from Chicago to Manhattan, KS around 1:30pm, the same day; putting us 15 minutes away from Fort Riley around 3:30 pm.
**Side note: I also booked our on post stay in Riley for August 9th as our check-in, AND we had secured a rental car at Manhattan airport for the same date.
On Sunday August 6th, two days before our flight, a dude we had met (on our initial flight to Germany, haha) who happened to be staying in our hotel as we all looked towards America casually states that our flight has been delayed.
WHAT?
He explains where to find the passenger terminal on Facebook that states the delay, and other delays. Well, we're not on FB, but we jumped on public view, and sure enough, flight is delayed to August 9th; time to be determined.
My husband calls up the passenger terminal, and they air force dude confirms the delay. Then he calls SATO, who has zero knowledge of the delay, but they say not to change anything just yet because they had experienced delays before where (for some reason) everything ends up working out. Okay, then.
***So, at 12:30am, on August 8th, our scheduled bus to Ramstein is supposed to pick us up at the Vilseck Kristal Inn. We ask the hotel front desk if this should change because of the delay. They say "NO", and proceed to tell us that the bus, no matter what, only rolls through on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 12:30am. End of story.
At 12:00am midnight on August 8th, we made our way to the front of the hotel along with a handful of others families. Hopped on the bus, and to Ramstein we went, not knowing shit about when we'd actually depart.
Once in Ramstein (we got there at 5am, no stops in between), the bus dumps us at the passenger terminal and an Air Force dude explains he will hold a quick brief in the terminal at 8am.
There was seriously nothing to do but wait. So we got cozy, and waited. There is a nice USO area in the upstairs of the passenger terminal, but otherwise, everything else on post is closed at 5am. If I remember correctly, the Ramstein USO didn't open until 6am or 7am???
Around 7am, some air force dude hollers at everyone in the terminal, stating there would be a briefing at 2pm about what's going on. But he and a few other guys in uniform begin signing meal vouchers for every person on the flight roster.
The vouchers were helpful, but also somewhat confusing. I had never seen them before.
It's basically a gift certificate for X amount of dollars, valid for a one time use.
We received two $15, two $20, and one $25 meal vouchers PER PERSON. It was insane. These are only valid to use in the food court or Burger King, not any "sit down" restaurant on base, to include Chili's.
How They Work:
The dollar amounts did not specify a time of day we could use them. So for breakfast that morning, we went to Subway, and I start ordering for myself and the kids, thinking I could use a $25 voucher for all of it. NOPE. The lady tells us that the $15 vouchers are for breakfast, the $20 for lunch, and the $25 for dinner, only.
Dumb.
Let's say your glutenous breakfast total is $17.50. You can use one $15 voucher and pay the difference out of pocket. Or, if you're like us and you have multiple vouchers, you can use two $15 vouchers to cover the total BUT you do not get the difference back NOR is the difference something you can use later. Once you give them the voucher, it's gone. So order ALL THE THINGS! USE THAT SHIT UP!
Sure enough, at the 2pm brief, the same guy from before explains there is a delay and that we wouldn't be leaving that day at 5pm as schedule, but THE NEXT day on August 9th at 8pm instead.
While we are all sitting in the terminal, pissed off and groaning, he also starts to explain that there is no vacancy at the Ramstein Inn and that the Air Force would be coordinating overnight stays for everyone, BUT because it was a last minute thing, people would be staying as far as Frankfurt!!! That's about a 2 hour drive, one way, on a GOOD day. And guess what? Not a single one of us in the terminal have cars around.
I look at my husband and he looks at me. We both had "the look" of terror. We have a six person family and booking a hotel on a normal day is hard enough. I wasn't trying to have the Air Force coordinate our hotel when they did a poor enough job at coordinating a flight.
My husband then says "I think the SATO lady who booked our flight said something about the Ramstein Inn when I called to ask about the delay...If I remember right, she asked if I wanted a room."
In a moment of hope, I tell him to run his ass to the front desk and ask if we have a confirmed stay on the books. He comes back to the terminal, and explains that we did not have a reservation, but they were able to get us a family room on base! That same guys who we flew to Germany with (and let us know about the initial delay) overheard us talking and we invited him to stay with us, if he didn't want to fuss with staying in Frankfurt. He says he'd go check and see if they could get him his own room and sure enough, they could.
My point: The Ramstein Inn had vacancy even though we were told they didn't. If a similar situation happens to you, it doesn't hurt to ask!
The on-base airport/hotel shuttle picked us up, with all of our luggage (the Ramstein terminal does not have a luggage hold) and dropped us off in a small housing area near the elementary school. It's a stairwell apartment that we've stayed in before, in an actual neighborhood, but is maintained by the hotel. We knew what to expect.
After calling my rental car company and hotel in Kansas to push back our reservation dates by a day (thankfully that was easy), we walked to the BX for dinner, watched a movie or two in the 'hotel' room, woke up the next morning, called the shuttle and were brought back to the terminal, luggage, kids and all.
What comes next was a blur. Around the mid afternoon, all passengers had to be accounted for, and once we were, we weren't allowed to leave the area, which we didn't need to anyway. We ate an early dinner at the BX knowing they'd be rounding everyone up soon enough and then we waited, and waited, and waited.
Finally, we were called to board, but they do it so weird. They call everyone to a "gate" that only has a bathroom and two vending machines, and then we wait another hour or so in that containment area.
And finally, we actually begin to board the plane, though doing so took forever, too. Higher ups go first, and then the rest of us cattle follow.
Once we were seated, I could finally breathe! That was until some severe turbulence made me want to puke. I'm not afraid of flying, but there's something about knowing you're over the Atlantic ocean, high in the sky, with nothing but the depths of the ocean under you...
When we landed in America, it was surreal.
Our family used every weekend, holiday, and block leave in Germany to travel all over Europe. We never went home to visit in the three years we were stationed there!
But before we could get excited, we knew that delay would come back to haunt us...
I've always wondered why you see weirdos sleeping on airport floors. Now I know.
Originally, our flight from Germany was set to arrive at 7am in Baltimore, but with the delay and time change of the flight being pushed, we arrived at 1:30am.
Our connecting flight wasn't until 11am.
We set up camp in the Baltimore airport, drank and ate a bunch of Dunkin Donuts (it was all that was open), and a few of our kids took naps on the marble floor! We became "those" people.
Once we boarded our second flight, ON TIME, everything was pretty seamless. From Baltimore, we hopped to Chicago, and from there, Manhattan, Kansas.
Once in Manhattan, we went to the rental car counter (there's only one) and picked up our ride. First stop: Walmart!
Walmart is nothing short of glorious when you've lived without it for so long. They sell everything.
So yay!
We're backkkkk and it feels great! But getting here was no easy feat.
The point of this post is to inform folks that sometimes things just don't go your way when flying at Ramstein. If I could go back in time, I would've booked a hotel at Ramstein for the night of our flight, just in case. We were lucky to get into the hotel, but many people weren't.
I recommend booking a reservation at Ramstein for the night of your flight + another night, and if you get lucky without delays, it's simple: Cancel it. No harm, no foul!
Our next journey is daunting: Getting our car from St Louis, MO, finding a house, enrolling kids into school, learning our way around, and tracking our household goods. Sounds SO fun!
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