Alaska – Land Tour with Grand Circle

This is the map of the trip I’m supposed to be on right now. It is also the map of the trip I canceled last night.

Why?

Well, here’s the “Readers Digest Version:
After spending the day at Newark airport, with close to an hour on the phone rescheduling flights, followed by a little over two hours sitting on a hot plane on a Newark airport runway, I’d had enough.

The flight crew had “timed out” on this second rescheduled flight, so when we returned to the gate, I didn’t wait around to see whether they were successful in finding a crew to fly to Anchorage. I knew that leaving Newark after 6 PM would guarantee that I’d miss my connecting flight, resulting in my having to stay overnight in Anchorage, then find a flight to Fairbanks the next morning. I was hot, tired, and hungry. That is not a good way to start an eight hour flight, so I returned home.

As soon as I entered the taxi, I called United to cancel my flight. Although I was on hold long enough to travel 35 minute drive home from the airport, cook my dinner and eat it, it was worth the wait because United is completely refunding my plane fare.

I hope I’m as lucky with the Travel Insurance Company attached to my Visa Sapphire Preferred card. That’s today’s adventure- submitting a claim for the cost of the OAT trip. I also have an annual policy with Trawick that is secondary, so I figured I’d start with Chase and let the two insurance companies figure it out. (I know about subrogation from my insurance days). I bought Trawick’s annual policy because some countries are now requiring a minimum of $200,000 in expatriation benefits, and Chase only covers up to $100,000. This is my first time having duplicate coverage, so I hope it isn’t a hassle, having the additional coverage through a different company.

Actually, if truth be told, I’m not THAT disappointed that I had to cancel the trip. It was only for 11 days, and I would have missed at least 2 of them. I’d been to Alaska in 2024, with my friend Jean, and I know it would not be as much fun traveling without her.

So, no photos of Denali or cute animals on this post. Next trip will be to Borneo, Java, Bali and Komodo Island, leaving on Sunday, September 13. I hope you’ll join me on THAT trip, which will be almost a month long.