In transit: 3 days, 3 continents and luggage drama at Heathrow

It took us 3 days to get to Cape Town. First we flew from Oregon to London, had a 36 hour layover and then continued on to Cape Town direct from London.

Our trip from Oregon to London was seamless. We flew standby on Continental, and made all of our flights. Chris’ mom works for Continental, and generously offered us the use of her companion/vacation passes. She also flew with us on the second leg of our journey to make sure that we made the flights and to see us off on our big adventure to Africa (Chris and Mary Pat got bumped up to first class, and I joined them in the front of the plane about halfway through the trip…Continental flight attendants are the best!!!).

We were all super tired when we got to London, but it was great to see Chris’ mom, and they extra day of jet lag recovery before our long flight to South Africa was a life-saver. Our hotel was in Windsor, so while we didn’t actually stay in the city of London, we did enjoy a relaxing afternoon in Windsor. The following morning we said goodbye to Mary Pat and headed to the airport.

That’s when things stopped going so smoothly, and all hell broke loose. To add some context to the story, take a close look at the following photo taken at PDX:

From Pre-africa departure (CA and OR)

We have a LOT of luggage. Granted we packed for a year, and needed to bring a combination of work attire, travel gear, etc. But still, it’s a lot of stuff…even for me (which is saying something).

We got to the South African Airways check-in desk and were informed that we were only allowed 20 kg of check luggage and 8 kg of hand luggage per customer. We had significantly more than that (like another 30 kg each).

Uh-oh. So we just need to pay a moderate extra baggage charge, right? Not the end of the world.

In my dreams. It turns out that South African Airways charges £36 per kilo (over $3,000 to for the excess baggage). Uh-oh. That’s a LOT of days of safari. Attempting not to panic, we explained that we were moving from the US, and were completely unaware that their baggage allowances were so restrictive. We actually tried to research this BEFORE we bought the tickets, and were under the impression that we would be allowed 2 bags each, which is typical for an international long-haul flight. This was actually one of our reasons for buying these specific tickets, so you can probably understand our frustration when we were totally stonewalled by the SAA employees. They were merciless.

They did, however, inform us that there was a baggage scale around the corner and a shipping service downstairs. At this point, we only had an hour before the flight was set to close, so we lugged our bags around the corner, and proceeded to unpack and repack EVERYTHING in a panicked mad-dash. Then we raced to the baggage shipping office with our tornado of luggage chaos (effectively scaring the crap out of the poor polish dude working there). The luggage shipping service was less expensive than the additional luggage charge, but it was not cheap. I’m 95% certain that SAA is in cahoots with the shipping company. The check-in agent was just a little too quick to suggest the shipping company as a solution. I’m still angry about this and am launching my own personal boycott of South African Airlines. Ha! Take that!

While the luggage debacle wasn’t the ideal first impression of South Africa, things quickly changed when we arrived safely in Cape Town on day 3. The city is amazing, and all of the people have been incredibly warm and friendly. Stay tuned for the next installment of our stories from South Africa…

-Julia

From Pre-africa departure (CA and OR)

Obligatory England phone booth photo

From Pre-africa departure (CA and OR)

Chris with Mary Pat on our walk in Windsor

From Pre-africa departure (CA and OR)

Windsor Castle!