Jeff Lawson ([info]bovineone) wrote,
@ 2007-06-28 12:44:00
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Entry tags:travel

Flighty
So last week when I was in San Jose on a business trip I decided to try to return back to Austin as standby on a flight that would depart about 1.5 hours earlier (at 4:40pm instead of 7:00pm). As it turned out, that SJC-AUS American Airlines flight was supposed to have regularly taken off at 9:30am, but had been delayed all day due to late equipment.

In any case I got a nice email crediting me some frequent flier miles for my "inconvenience" of flying on an earlier flight. :)

    It's completely realistic for our valued customers to rely on the scheduled departure and arrival of their flights. For that reason, we were disappointed to learn that flight 1810 was delayed on June 20 and we wanted to take the opportunity to apologize to you for the disruption of your travel plans.

    I realize that our expression of regret is of small consolation in light of the time you spent waiting in San Jose for your flight to depart. I hope you will accept the addition of 10,000 Customer Service Bonus miles to your AAdvantage® account as a more tangible apology. You should see this mileage adjustment in your account very soon.

It looks like I'll soon have enough miles to be Silver Elite on Continental and Gold Elite on AA this year (my first time for either).

And I'm going to Paris for 6 days in two weeks for JFC's wedding! [info]reanimated is coming too, though neither of us have been to Paris before nor speak any French so I'm expecting we'll be wondering around semi-lost at least part of the time. After a couple of days Sravish will rendezvous with us and we'll head to JFC's wedding together. Bastille day (the day of the wedding) should have some interesting sights and celebrations to see also. Anyone have any recommendations of things to see/avoid in Paris? Wikitravel has some good suggestions and tips already...

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Paris!
[info]ivo
2007-06-28 07:39 pm UTC (link)
10k miles for a delayed flight? Wow. But I guess that's comporable with the mandatory $200 or so they should give people...

With respect to Paris, I was there just last week (no pics up yet... but there's a pic here) and showed Chantal the usual "first time" landmarks: Tour Eiffel, Quartier Latin, Louvre, Arc de Triomphe, Champs-Elysees, Montmartre. Also recommend taking the elevator in the Grand Arche. It's pretty much Paris-for-tourists, but to explore the more intimate cute back-alley parts of Paris while not visiting the Eiffel Tower on a first trip sounds weird to me :)

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[info]paradox0220
2007-06-28 07:56 pm UTC (link)
JFC is about to have an umm-wife!? Wow!

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[info]reanimated
2007-06-28 07:56 pm UTC (link)
i say all the touristy stuff can be done a few days, right? or is that overly ambitious? ;-) then leave the rest of the time for trying to be less of a stupid american.

*facepalm* get this, my dad told me AFTER i bought my ticket that he was told that i could in fact use his miles. so now he and i need to figure out if i can indeed use his and my miles for any part of this.

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[info]bovineone
2007-06-28 08:07 pm UTC (link)
Well, it was still pretty difficult to find any available award flights even if you had wanted to use frequent flier miles to purchase the tickets. I don't think there's much point in trying to do something different now, since getting a refund and repurchasing will involve cancellation fees.

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[info]reanimated
2007-06-28 08:18 pm UTC (link)
well, he said he was going to call and talk to someone to see if anything could be done. i'll see what he says. if it's going to just be more hassle, forget it.

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[info]decibel45
2007-06-28 09:28 pm UTC (link)
Hrm, you sure those points will count towards status? I'd expect that they wouldn't...

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[info]bovineone
2007-06-28 09:49 pm UTC (link)
Nope, those 10,000 miles didn't count towards status, but I've flown 22k qualifying miles on AA this year already and I only need to get to 25k to qualify for Gold. Just one more continental round-trip this year might do it.

I'll have the Continental qualification after I land in Paris (depending on how long they take to recognize the qualification).

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Pig Alley
[info]texaspatsfan
2007-06-29 12:20 am UTC (link)
Everything that Ivo said, and if you want an "interesting" experience, walk down Pigalle (known as Pig Alley during WWII). That's where all the sex shops and Moulin Rouge are located.

That's where I saw some lady from an "establishment" chasing down some poor guy to try to get him into her clutches. And where I was offered $1000 for...well, I'm not sure what exactly, but I can guess! :) It's buy MonteMarte if I remember.

Get the walking tours from one of those guide books. At least then you won't miss the locally known stuff ... like where some artists lived and histories of some building and such.

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