I was surprised to see someone holding up a sign with my name on it when I deplaned, but a woman was there to greet me and she informed me that she would be helping me transfer to a USA bound flight. It later appeared that she was working for the airport so I don’t know if I was given special treatment because I was in F or if it was because I was transferring to a USA bound flight.

I had been expecting to just walk down the special corridor for passengers going international-USA, thus able to bypass Canadian customs, but the agent told me that before we could do that they had to see if my luggage was with the first group (which I suspect is the bundle for connecting flights. We waited at the intersection between customs and the special corridor for info from the baggage crew. A few minutes later they called back saying that my luggage was not in this group so I would have to pick it up from the arrivals belt and go through customs. My luggage had been tagged all the way to IAD so I’m not sure what would happen if someone wasn’t met at the gate like I was. I suppose their luggage would get the Dulles eventually, but I don’t think it would make the connection.


Empty Immigration lines

I filled out an immigration card and approached the border control officer. She asked what the purpose of my trip was and how long I was staying – I responded with transfer and 3 hours. She looked up, intrigued now, before asking if I would be leaving anything in Canada and such. After a quick discussion, she stamped my customs form and I was on my way.

After passing the customs checkpoint – I was finally at the baggage claim where my luggage was one of the first ones off the belt.


Waiting for my luggage

The airport agent led me to the transborder portion of the terminal where she informed me that the UA agents (though really they were contracted agents) would not be here for another hour and a half. I asked, “since my bag had been tagged to IAD already and I have a boarding pass, do I still need to see the agent?” She said yes, though later after talking with an agent after they set up shop, I realized I could’ve just gone through. As I had some time to kill, I decided to reprint my BP at the kiosk. I did so and noticed I had gotten flagged with the dreaded SSSS on my BP. Well seeing as how I already had a BP, I just stashed the new one away to never be seen again


View from the outside

The US bound portion of the terminal was always quiet during the 1 ½ hours I waited, it didn’t seem like there were too many flights that departed from this part of the terminal at any one time.


The busiest time at the US bound flight portion of the terminal

After entering the terminal, I headed over to the Maple Leaf Lounge. My credentials were checked and I was welcomed in. The lounge would remain fairly empty during my hour there (no more than 4 people) as there were only 5 more flights leaving for the states all evening.


Entrance to the Maple Leaf Lounge


Swiss heading back to Zurich - wishing I could be in F again


Seating areas in the lounge with views of the tarmac


Some of the simple offerings in the lounge


Other side of the lounge

I grabbed a bag of chips to nibble on and used the free wi-fi while I waited. Our plane would be late arriving, but I went ahead and left the lounge about half an hour before our original departure time.


Empty transborder terminal area

The plane arrived about the time we were scheduled for departure, but they turned the E-145 around in literally 3 minutes and called for all rows all passengers.


First officer doing preflight preparations

Once airborne, we were offered a beverage service as is standard on UA and UA Express flights. I had been thrust back into reality now in this all Y configured plane.


Back to reality where ads are all over your napkins

The flight was otherwise uneventful and upon landing, we had to wait 5-10 minutes before our plane could taxi into the stand position – ah, the good old A gates. I quickly headed to baggage claim where my bag was already on the belt when I arrived (I hate that UA Express bags are all placed onto one belt, it makes it fairly chaotic sometimes), I’m not sure if priority tagging worked or if I was just lucky, but I suspect I was just lucky.


End of a long journey - waiting for the hotel shuttle