Well, my 15,000 miles of right thru flights returning from the wonderful DUS Altbier/Goosenfest Doozie on the weekend have come badly unstuck, as UA have stranded me in SFO for 24 hours as the ORD-SFO connection arrived an hour after the one daily SYD flight had gone.

Flew back from DUSSELDORF to ORD with AnnaS and Miletex all up front in Business Class on United. WHAT a flight!!! We each received an elaborate UA card signed with personal messages by all staff from the Captain down, and all copped a wrapped bottle of French booze, and had them smuggle us Dom Perignon from First thru the flight as well. (I suspect Miletex and I drank both flights Transatlantic more value in Dom than our coach tickets cost us!) The staff all sang "Happy Birthday" to AnnaS mid flight as well, and gave her a bunch of flowers. Wonderful bunch of FA's and I for one have sent off a personal letter of thanks to UA brass, with names of staff, about the amazing service offered both ways to DUS by UA. Nice to read comments above from cesgog and auh20 who seemed to receive the same superb in-flight service from those crew on the first flight, that we invited to dinner

Anyway, being a new 1K on United makes a huge difference. The delay getting to SFO was caused by ATC, clearly not a United problem. They really needed offer no accomodation, but sprung for two nights at the new Radisson here, with cab and meal vouchers etc. The walk up rate is $235 a night as SFO is heavily oversold right now.

So, anyone in SFO who is about during today Tuesday, and wishes to catch up somewhere, please give me a call direct at the hotel. My flight to SYD does not leave til 11.30pm Tues 14th, so even dinner will fit in fine. Radisson Airport @ Sierra Point 415 467 4400, room 732, Glen Stephens.

United have said they will likely offer me a sleeper seat in First on the 14 hour flight SYD-SFO (off a coach ticket!) due to the hassle, so that will be nice if it comes off.

bagold .. what a small world that you ended up sitting next to Miletex on his ORD-Dallas flight. We both changed our original onward flights from the RCC, so you almost missed the chance it seems. Hope he managed to schmooze some Dom for you on THAT flight ... sitting next to Richard on long flights is a big travelling plus, I am here to tell you!

MIZU ... great photos! You'll need to come up some captions with names, so we can all print out a set! That will be a neat site when they are all up. Thanks for your help and Bernies in being the local guides there, and to you for finding us the cyber cafe.

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~ Glen ~

[This message has been edited by ozstamps (edited 11-14-2000).]

Belle, Don't believe whoever it was. That person is telling a story!!!! This was my 3rd and they were all very exciting.

A personal and heartfelt "Thank You" to Bernie, Mizu, Rudi and any others that helped plan this special event. I have had a better time meeting FTers than touring any city by myself. Thanks to all who attended.

As for what flight Darlene and I took, Bernie would be proud. We are DL and OneWorld fliers but today we were fortunate to travel on *A for the first time. Since we hadn't booked a return flight home yet, I called DL and inquired as to what the price would be out of DUS and AMS for JAN- HNL - JAN - BUD. Since departing from DUS was only $50 more expensive, we opted to spend a few more hours in bed and leave from DUS.

Apparently DL has an "interline?" agreement with LH and booked us with LH from DUS - FRA and then DL onward to home (JAN). Upgraded all the way too.

Upon arriving the DUS airport with only 45 minutes to spare, the LH agent said DL had set the reservation up incorrectly. Since it was very close to our flight time, we just purchased a o/w biz flight on LH in hopes DL would refund the money.

The LH flight was fine. We even got a miniature car and a chocolate steering wheel of the Audi TT. (The car both Bernie and I would like to have).

Once at FRA, we spoke to the DL ticketing agent and she said everything looked fine in our reservation and wondered why LH did not issue the ticket. She said that since we would be flying through FRA in two weeks time that she would go with us to LH and see about getting us a refund on our return.

Another problem was that all of our upgrades were now gone. Fortunately everything was available again except for the HNL - JAN portion this weekend.

Then she said the system wide upgrade was only good to the first stopover. That's funny, last month on the AMS - JAN - HNL - JAN - AMS trip two systemwides covered the entire trip. Now she was saying I would need three (four if HNL- JAN were avalable). Whatever. She had been very helpful and nice so far so I decided to deal with it when I get home.

The flight FRA - ATL was fine except for the purser. She told me to get my tray table out if I wanted lunch and at the end of the flight she moved my girlfriend's seat to landing position and stowed her inseat video WHILE SHE WAS PLAYING A VIDEO GAME. We both thought we had just missed the announcement but 10 minutes later the announcement to stow the video units and raise seatbacks came on.

I thought it to be very rude and complained to a concierge I knew when I got off of the plane. I hope she actually does something about it. One other time no notes were made in my account and no reply from DL was ever received.

The other FA's were very nice and everything else was fine (except for the food.....bland and either overcooked or cold...which isn't my experience typically).

Let's all go back for a few days.....3 mad days for example.

Chris Moss


[This message has been edited by ChrisMoss7 (edited 11-14-2000).]

yeah, chris, let us roll the time back to last weekend....
am soooo having one BIG case of after the party blues here in atlanta....

A belated vielen danke to Rudi, Bernie and Mizu for their gemutlichkeit in putting together the Dusseldorf party! It was worth the eleven hour flight from Paris to participate!

CocoaNut

I'm sooooo sorry for the bad flt. home you had
Bad food bad purser

xtra wide seats ... xtra wide armrests ... caviar xtra .... bogner sweat xtra .... 200% xtra miles see .... !

I was going to ask for 10000000 1K systemwides and a couple of confirmed north-american upgrades, but the Argentinian ambassador made a counter-offer... So, is there any reason for you changing locations other than the new job?

OK, maybe if next time you actually get up and talk to the gal you're looking at all night, I will simply post the pictures of the two of you...

Also want to post my thanks to Bernie, Mizu and Rudi for a great time in DUS. What a great time and great lot of people. Can't wait for the next one

Muchos Gracias! Bernie, Mizu & Rudi your extraordinary preparation and planning for this weekend, my first FT event, ensures that it will not be the last. It was a pleasure meeting the participants and I am sorry that the short time made it almost impossible to meet and talk with everyone.
Bernie if SFO is one of your "westcoast cities" on your rtw I would be more than pleased to see you again.

Jim

Thank you for being great hosts. It was a time to remember. Many great people there.

Chris, what happened to you and Darlene at breakfast on Sunday? Celebrating a birthday perhaps?

Well, even with smoozing the FA's at the goose dinner, Scott the flyer and I were not able to get upgraded. Too many full fares ahead of us. But you should have seen the eyes looking at us in coach when the First Class steward came back and served us Dom Perignon in crystal glasses and left the bottle. We felt very important indeed.

Thanks again to all the FT'rs who made it a great weekend.

Baze

Magic ... my rtw will indeed brimg me to SFO. I'll be there around 12/26. Mizu will be in town, too. We are almost decided on meeting for dinner. We'll let you know.

Baze & Scott even schmoozing with UA people doesn't work. At least they weren't that drunk the night the night before, that they recognized you and you got your champagne.

btw Chris did tell me at 10pm on sunday, that it was Darlene's birthday (and AnnaS's birthday the NEXT day), but we kind of got a small improvised birthday bash at "my" pub ... the guys there even managed some "confetti".

[This message has been edited by bernie (edited 11-15-2000).]

Sorry - fly to Tampa early morning of 12/26 and return 12/31

Around 12 / 26 around Magic, could be the 24th or 25th as well.

For the benefit of those who were not there (we were down to about a dozen DUS survivors by then!) the "confetti" tossed at the witching hour of midnight on Anna's birthday consisted of a large wad of 4" diameter thin drink coasters. Like a blizzard in Antarctica

Funniest thing I even saw. What a mess to clean up later. Great pub Bernie .. couldn't help but notice it was 50 yards from your place, so bet they know you well!

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~ Glen ~



[This message has been edited by ozstamps (edited 11-15-2000).]

Well I for one would like to thank Bernie, mizu and Rudi for the exceptionally good time that I had. It was an absolute blast and I can't wait for the Weekend at Bernie's Deux . Well we may not have gotten our upgrades but the bottle of 1992 Dom and two premium bottles of wine before landing were much appreciated.I now have a new love and it's name is Alt, even the waiter said "Thank you for coming, hurry back the Alt is waiting" geez I think that's a compliment . Premex keep an eye out in your mail for a special friend that was the center of attention at the Altbier. We had to rescue your sweetie from that notorious Kokonuts but she only has eyes for you. For all that didn't make it I am truely sorry as it was the party of the century. ( alt alt alt !! )



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Cheers Scott

I was so hoping Daisy was going to make it to Southern California. While she is from Florida, I think in her heart she is a California girl. Too bad she did not get there until after the Rams moved to St. Louis.