JFK to Frankfurt

It’s Sunday morning and I check out of my hostel. I am informed that to get to JFK I can choose a $65 taxi or a two hour subway ride. Choices choices. As my flight is at 5pm and it’s only 11am, time is no issue so I’ll catch the Subway.

The subway!

While swapping trains, I made friends with another girl who had a suitcase and who was going to JFK. After training for a long time, we are one stop away and a lady on the train says to another suitcase bearing couple (as the doors are closing) that, if you’re going to the airport then you have to get off now because this train is changing lines! So they quickly run off but me and the girl don’t have time! So we get off at the next stop to swap trains and go back to the station. The tracks are in the middle so to get to the other side we have to go down the stairs, then up again with all our luggage but a nice old man sees us and tells us that two stops up the platform is in the middle so it’ll be easier for us to swap there. So we wait and wait. After twenty minutes we decide that we have already done most of the journey so we’ll get a taxi. We head downstairs and the man is there and we tell him the train didn’t come and now we’re going to get a taxi. He informs us that there aren’t many taxis around here. We try anyway and after ten minutes the train comes. It really felt like everything was going against us. Ten minutes later, the man was able to wave down a taxi for us and we were able to get to the airport. This was however the beginning of my problems.

Well actually, first I went to the wrong terminal but it was only a short walk to the next one. So while in the taxi, the girl (who was from Turkey and studying in Amsterdam) had helped me to realise that I would most probably miss my connecting flight from Frankfurt to Prague. I was meant to arrive in Frankfurt, Germany at 0740 and then my flight to Prague was at 0925. The international flight meant passport checking, luggage carousel, customs, get to domestic terminal, check in to flight by 0845. I had booked them close together on purpose but now I realised that I didn’t have enough time and while my hopes were still up, the girl just gave me that sympathetic look and shook her head. Then with sadness in her eyes told me I wasn’t going to make it. She didn’t even say, oh you might have a chance, she just plain out told me I was going to miss it. So I started weighing up my options, cancel and rebook now OR try catch it, then cry at the counter and hope they put me on another flight for free. I couldn’t do anything until I had checked in and gone through the gates, so as I was checking in I mentioned something at the counter about my connecting flight and the lady said not to worry because they will move my baggage for me but I told her that I had booked the flights separately so I had to do the luggage. She then asked who I was flying with and I said Czech Airlines. Hmmm I think we might have a luggage agreement with them...turns out they did and she was able to organise it for my luggage to go straight onto my Czech flight!! Fantastic! I wouldn’t have to wait for it at the carousel and I could skip customs! Valuable time savers!



On the plane to Frankfurt



A plane being pushed out





My plane meal which included chicken and beans sitting on some sort of mash which was delicious (tasted a little like mashed potato but with cinnamon?), a roll, butter, salad with ranch dressing, cheese and crackers, brownie and a nice glass of red wine!



My flight to Frankfurt was forty five minutes early! I had asked for a seat at the front of the plane so I was quick to get off and one of the first through the passport checking. Then I hurried past the luggage carousel (yay!) and straight through customs. Turned out that my next flight was at the same terminal! So I checked in and even had time to grab a coffee while I brushed up on my german! Guten morgen! Cappucino bitte? And then of course, danke (thank you).

So in the end, everything went right at exactly the right time in regards to luggage, being early and being at the same terminal!

So my tale is nearly at its end, I promise! We left Frankfurt half an hour late and then at Prague airport there was crazy thick fog right over the airport and the captain let us know that we would take an extra fifteen minutes to land because of the hazardous weather conditions. We couldn’t see the fog because we were in the clouds so it all just looked like clouds out our windows. We started circling down and it took forever but we circled all the way down to the airport and the whole time I (and probably 99% of the rest of the plane) thought we were up in the clouds but then all of a sudden it was like BANG as the wheels hit the runway and we could JUST see the runway and a couple of planes!! THAT’S how foggy it was and the whole plane gasped as we landed, proving the surprise of everyone!

Guess who's bag was first out of the luggage carousel. That’s right, yours truly. As I went to pick it up, I walked past a guy who had spoken to me in Czech before and I held up my finger and said, number one. He just looked at me confused until I had actually picked up my bag but it was just fantastic how, in the end, everything had come together perfectly. Dad even got lost on the way to the airport and was late but neither of us had to wait, as I was late too! Fun fact: my bag was also first out in New York!!!! Some people call it a gift. I agree with them.

Thank you for getting to the end of my airport adventure, now it’s time to explore Poland!