Hello London!
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When David called, we were halfway into the second year of the pandemic. He had cabin fever and was bored out of hius mind up in Alaska, and I had been struggling with this gnawing feeling that my life was getting stagnant and I was just biding my time before dying. Sounds dumb, but that's where my mind went. So wo hen he told me that hius remedy for his he was feeling was to book a trip to London to see a favorite DJ of his Yotto, my response was, "I want to go!". His answer was "then come!"
So I did!
(Feel free to jump right to the photo gallery below if you like.)
The trip was wonderful, but I must say, I learned a few things about international travel while on this adventure. I thought I would share the things that were in my blind spot that I would do differently next time.
The Airline Ticket
I booked my flight through Lufthansa directly. I got a great price, and I was excited to be flying on a European airline, since they tend to be nicer and less like getting on a Greyhound bus. When I booked it, I did see that it was actually operated by United Airlines, which is part of the Star Alliance group of airlines. That had happened in the past for other flights I have booked, and I had never had problems with related carriers before. So I forged on ahead, happy about my booking that came in below $600.
Well, that ended up causing problems when it was discovered that my names did not match up on my documents. This is more important and scrutinized when traveling internationally and there is a passport involved. When I went to check in online, as I always do for my domestic flights, I got all the way to the end only to find out that the name on my airline ticket was different than what is on my passport. “Names do not match, please check in at the airport” was the message I got.
I looked more closely at the name that was on my booking, and saw that there was an extra L in Elisabeth. It was spelled Elilsabeth. And I know why. My MacBook Air has always had a known issue for which there is no cure, and that is that the keyboard repeats stroked randomly. So my keyboard threw in an extra L just for fun, and I didn’t notice.
Should be easy enough to fix. So I got on the phone with… Lufthansa? United? Well, since the flight was a UA flight, I called them first. I spent 40 minutes on hold, and when I finally got an agent, she told me the name could not be changed. Why not? Because it was booked through Lufthansa, and they had ultimate control of the booking. Welp, there goes an hour. Hung up and called Lufthansa next. I got an agent within 5 minutes, yay! I told that agent the deal, and she attempted to change the name on my ticket. She goes into the system, to find out that an agent at her level does not have access and can’t change my name. But, I could rebook the flight at whatever the cost was currently, and they would refund the original ticket. I looked and by then, the same trip was already at $1,200. So I wasn’t about to do that. She suggested I call United again and maybe have them put it in their record that the name was misspelled but everything else was fine. So I called United back. Another 40 minutes on hold. And when I got the last agent, the final answer was, just check in at the airport and good luck.
So I leave super early, giving myself like, 4 hours lead time before my flight. I get to the International terminal at SFO, and because I was so early, there was no one at the United check in counters. I walked right up to an agent who was happy to help. I told her the situation, and she takes a look.
“I see. Your name has to be exactly the same as what is on your passport. Your ticket is missing your middle name.”
“wait, it’s not the extra L in my first name?”
“No, that’s no big deal. Misspellings happen. It’s that your ticket says Elisabeth Lyon and your passport says Elisabeth Ann Lyon.”
“Oooh! Damn, I didn’t even think of that.”
She checked me in, and all was well. I merrily proceeded to my gate.
The lesson? Always make sure the names on your documents match exactly, and proofread your name in case a faulty keyboard spells your name wrong!
Cell Phone Service
One of the wonderful conveniences that we enjoy these days is being able to use our own phones anywhere in the world when we travel. I remember well the days when internet cafés and land lines were the only way to communicate with home. On my last trip abroad to France, the service was pretty easy to figure out and I do not recall having much trouble getting connected. This time around, it was pretty difficult.
My carrier is Verizon, and a few days before I left I looked at international calling plans to set up. I wasn’t sure how much I would need, and I saw that there was the ability to call internationally already in place, it was just charged by the minute. So I thought, that sounds fine. I’ll just use that.
My flight lands and I’m now in Heathrow, able to connect to my Facebook Messenger via wifi, but I was not able to send an SMS. Huh? I thought I had set that up. So I manage to get a few messages to my friend Jerry, who was already there, and told him the situation. He said that he and the boys would meet me at the Brixton Underground station and take me to our airbnb. Awesome. Now I just have to figure out how to get cell phone service.
I found a Three store in the airport, and the person there said all I had to do was buy a sim card and it would work locally. Great! So I got a $25 sim card and swapped it out. But for some reason, I still could not send or receive an SMS. I continued on my journey and managed to make it to the Brixton Underground with the help of a sweet young lady who was leaving the airport terminal at the same time as I was. So I got to Brixton, but I had no way to reach my friends! I went up to the street, hoping they would be standing right there. Nope. I walk back and forth, and then see a Body Shop across the street with a big sign that said “free wifi here”. Oh thank God. I walked into the store, asked politely if I could just use their wifi to reach my friends. they said of course, and I was able to reach Jerry, and he said Stay right there! We’ll come get you. And within 3 minutes I was hugging my friends and we were heading to the airbnb.
I tried all day, here and there, to figure it out, with no success. Finally, as I was struggling to get to sleep that night, I thought, well I’m up, may as well see if Verizon has a chat and I can ask wtf via their website. I successfully got an agent on the live chat.
Ok so here’s the deal. A sim card can make calls and texts to anyone with a local number. Meaning in London. I was trying to connect with my friends who had USA numbers. That’s why it wasn’t working! Then I said well I though I had the international plan, and the agent said nope, you only have the plan that calls local numbers. What I needed was the beefed up plan, that does it all… and that would be $100 extra, for one month. But I didn’t need a month, I needed a week. Could I do it for 10 days? Nope. The only option was one month. So I had to suck it up and get the $100 plan if I wanted to not be limited to wifi. Which was essential since I never knew where I was going to be if I needed to connect with the boys. So that was that.
The lesson? Double check with an actual agent at your wireless carrier that the plan you are getting does what you need it to do. Just a quick call. It would have saved me quite a bit of anxiety once I entered the UK.
