November 07, 2005
Vacation Disaster Avoidance
Autumn Atrium Kingwood Estate Mansfield Ohio... no disaster here, our trip to Ohio last year was one of the best ever.
Woody and I have traveled a lot of miles together. In ten years of marraige we have packed the old suitcases over 50 times. Thats a lot. Cruises, road trips and flying vacations to various parts of the world. Over this time we have learned a few tips tricks, and had a few bumps along the way... This has developed into a method we call the Vacation Disaster Avoidance System or VDAS for short. We impliment VDAS everytime we travel. The method is as follows.
1. Use an agent. I dont care what Bill Shatner says, you CAN get great deals using a human booking these things and you have the added atvantage of having a human to bitch at if things go haywire, and they do, all of the time.
2. Place accomodations on hold, get a phone number, then call the place to find out if what the agent knows, is what actually IS...such as bed size. We are big people, double beds only sleep two migets not two normal sized adults...whos kidding who here. If the bed is not a queen or bigger it best have two beds. Woody and I do not care about separation, but we do care about too much togetherness. Smoking Nonsmoking is another critical issue as well as view, location, amenities ect. Get a name
3. Work out transportation and book it... Then book the location. If airfare stinks may be its that you should go someplace else. This trip we chose to drive as the airfare was crazy...
4. 5. 6. there are other tidbits but for the sake of this story we shall leave the ones we have up there for now...
Two weeks ago Woody called RCI and booked on 24 hour hold that lovely place in Sarasota. The rules have always been that if you dont call and cancel a 24 hour hold you own it. So once we decided to drive we didnt think much more about it. We own it right....
Woody called the resort saturday to request a room in a good location, non smoking, all the usual things that we do the week before that you cant do sooner. I nearly had a athsma attack from hyper ventalting as I listened to the conversation...
Hello this is mr Wood, and I have a reservation...
Im sorry Mr. Wood, but nothing is reservered under your name here
I know I exchanged via RCI
Sorry sir there is nothing
Hello RCI, this is MR Wood and I have a problem
No Mr Wood you dont have a reservation, you failed to confirm so we released the room to another party...
I have never had to do that in 25 years of timesharing
Well we are sorry but there is nothing there for you
But I have made all of the arrangements
Sorry would you like to go to Hilton Head?
No I want to go to Florida what do you have....
Three hours of tag team computer hacking and mutual agreement and compromise have landed us in Panama City in a newly reopened time share right on the sand...Its older and there is still repairs going on from 2003 hurricane damage but the town is pretty and its 400 mile closer. Thank God we called in advance to re confirm or wed have driven extra miles for nothing. I am still pissed that the agent didnt tell Woody that the rules changed but VDAS saved us yet again...
So we leave tomorrow on the first leg of the trip after a doctors appointment Woody has. We drop off the kitties at the cat cottage and its off to Little Rock... Computer is traveleing with me as well as my camera. We have some interesting side trips planned because we dont have to drive all the way down to Sarasota. Any thing we should see in Alabama, Mississippi or The PanHandle of Florida? Let us know. We have 6 days to kill on the back hual.
