Travel Fails

/ Bulldog Travels

When it’s right, it’s right.  But, boy when it’s wrong it’s way wrong.  Have you ever had a travel fail?

I had a terrible sinus infection kick in on my last day in Spain once.  I was unable to take any medication unfortunately and didn’t really have any access to any anyway.  By the time I got on the airplane to fly home I was in a terrible amount of pain.  It was the most miserable flight I have ever been on.  Through a wonderful bout of fate our connecting flight in Washington DC was cancelled and we were forced to spend the night in DC!  This allowed me to get out of the airplane and sleep!  I had never been so happy to have a flight cancelled before.

In other travel fail related news, my husband fell and broke both of his ankles in a climbing accident a few years back while camping together on the coast.  One helicopter ride to an ambulance later we were at the hospital picking up a wheelchair and two casts.  The dog and I drove him home laying in the back seat of our jeep where we were promptly forced to take the doors off the hinges of most of the rooms in our house.  Ankle surgery followed and I am happy to report he is doing fine and has no ill effects.  And, yes, we are still happily married after all of that!

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Have you had any epic travel fails you care to share?  They are always so much more fun to share and laugh about later…

25 thoughts on “Travel Fails”

  2. All I can think of is our close calls:
    – The snow covered road outside Lava Beds NM that we decided not to drive then watched the next car slip into the ditch.
    – Driving out of Mojave National Preserve with a wine cork in the radiator and across the desert and home with a metal plug from the hardware store in place of a radiator cap
    – Cutting our camping trip short to get across the Merced before it flooded
    – Spinning out at 55mph between an 18 wheeler and an SUV in a snow storm on I-70 but recovering and passing the truck.
    – Having the canoe blow 1/2 way across the top of the trailer in a wind gust crossing the Missouri River.
    – Dodging thunderstorms paddling across Florence Lake.
    – 5 hours on the runway in Dallas during a snow storm but making our flight
    – Whatever I picked up in Thailand last month waited until I got home.
    But, it’s not an adventure until something goes wrong.

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      • The “frozen climber” who we rescued off the 500′ cliff in Big Sur had an epic travel fail. There are no travelers where I work now and, if there are, they made a wrong turn on their way home from Monterey. And, that is an epic travel fail, because there are a lot of sections of town that you really, really should not be.

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  4. I had the same travel fail just last November. I usually prefer to sit in the aisle but somehow I listened to my husband to take a window seat. He said it’ll be more comfortable but it turned out to be the opposite. I usually just follow my instincts but not sure why I listened to him this time! I was flying (solo) to Manila from Dallas with a stopover in Narita. First 15 minutes into the flight my head was starting to hurt and felt I was going to be sick. But with the Ebola cases that had just happened in Dallas I was afraid to get sick so I had to suck it up the whole 12+ hours. I didn’t want to alarm anyone. It was the most miserable flight I’ve had and not only did I feel sick, I was so claustrophobic! Ugghhh! But lesson learned. Never again will I take a window seat or listen to my husband. Lol!

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    • “Never again will I take a window seat or listen to my husband.” That sounds like it could be the name of a blog or blog post. Ha. That’s funny. Well now it is. At the time I am sure it was miserable. Thanks for sharing!

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  5. Gosh, broken ankles! That’s awful – glad to hear that he is recovered now!
    I had a travel fail – and it was a mess since at the beginning. We had a vacation booked to Antalya, Turkey. Then the airplane had engine problems and we had to stop in Budapest (Hungary) for a night. Back then Hungary was not Schengen country and not a EU member yet so as an Indonesian passport holder, I had to have visa to enter Budapest. And of course I did not have the visa because my destination was Turkey! The airline crew was nice and tried to arranged an urgent visa with the Hungarian authority – but it took hours to process it as they had to check my passport. Dutchie and I were the only passengers who left behind in the airport (the rest of passengers were Dutch or having European passports that allow them to enter Hungary without visa). I remember that I felt bit annoyed for having an Indonesian passport 😦 Then the misfortune was continued in Antalya. Maybe I should write a post about it because it was a total mess.
    Thank you so much for the inspiration and enjoy your travel!!

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  6. I can think of adventures, but I everything turns out to be a learning experience, so I am not bringing anything to mind that seems like a real fail.
    -Traveling in central Anatolia in March likely contributed to the bus getting stuck in a high mountain pass with 7 feet of snow. But…I watched the poor bus driver struggling to put chains on the tires and was struck by how in the U.S. it would have gone the exact same way. It helped make the country feel familiar to me.
    -Terrified and not speaking any Spanish at age 19 in Mexico, a man in the airport was screaming “6 dollars!” at me till I frantically dug through my purse and handed him $6 in desperation, and he immediately quieted down and handed me a taxi receipt and pointed out the way to the cabs.
    -Got dreadfully lost in a maze of narrow streets at the top of the hill in Patmos, Greece, but got a close-up view of housing and cranky old women and I found my way back to the beach in time to catch the last tether to the ship – so then I was all proud of my bad self. 😉
    -Two police offers came running up and yelling at me in French while I was trying to find peace in the shade in Avignon when it was 40 degrees out. I learned a great lesson in my first day in Provence: Stay off the grass in France!!
    -Ok, here’s a fail: Do not bring U.S. dollar coins to use as baksheesh in Egypt. People freak out. I could not figure out why. Egyptian coins were fine, U.S. dollars notes were fine.

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  7. Both ankles were broken?? Whoa….I’m glad he’s better now!

    As for my own stories…I once traveled 21 hours to Australia without knowing if I would be let into the country as there was an issue with the visa the travel agency got for me (note, that was the last time I used a travel agency). Sinus infection on New Year’s Eve by myself in Mexico City. Flat tire in Cornwall, England and none of us knew how to change a tire so we were stuck practically in the middle of nowhere for three hours. Missed my night train in Toulouse so had to spend the night at the train station (and between 2am and 5 am, they closed so I had to wait outside – thank goodness it was summer. but I had no phone so the folks with whom I was staying with had no idea what happened to me!). Played Russian Roulette with the food in Spain – I’m allergic to fresh pork and you’d be surprised where lard ends up! haha now that I think about it, I have lots of these stories!

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  8. A broken ankle must have been terrible !

    I’ve had altitude sickness in Quito, and I was vomiting all the time and unable to leave my hostel room for 1 full day. I’ve never felt that bad. I was vomiting everything, even water.

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  10. the first time I flew with a bad cold I thought my ear drums would burst -it was so painful. One of the stewardesses told me that I should get some Dimetapp sinus pills and now I bring them along on every trip just in case. They are not perfect but I’ve never had anything close to the pain level of that first trip!

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    • Glad to hear it was a one time occurrence! It certainly could have been worse! I hope it didn’t ruin your trip.

      Thanks for stopping by my blog. I would be honored if you would follow along with my adventures.

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