Wow... thats almost exactly like my experience. I flew every summer to see my Dad. First he lived in Atlanta for 3 years and I flew Eastern (mid-70s) from EWR-ATL. I remember them losing my luggage and waiting a couple of days for them to deliver it. I must have been about 5 and unaccompanied but with my step-brother, same age.

Then he moved to Dallas in 1975 and I flew Braniff most of the time. I always wondered what color plane I would get! Hopefully blue! I loved the kit with the wings, playing cards... and getting extra attention from the stewardess. ... and yes, airplane food seemed great to me! When I would get into DFW, dad would take me to the arcade in the terminal (was next to where the baggage carousels are) and play some pinball. After Braniff went under, I switched to AA.

When I got older one time Dad booked me a "hopskotch fare" as he called it. It was on Piedmont and I did EWR-RDU-CLT then CLT-DFW. The irony was the gate counter in EWR was shared by the flight I was connecting to in CLT, but 30 mins later! I asked, can't I just get on this plane since thats what I am eventually connecting to?? "NOPE". That was my first connection on my own... I did it ok. I imagine someone must have escorted me, I dont remember. I was probably a teenager at that time.

Also fun was the Concorde flew into DFW back then. One time it passed us as we were flying in and the pilot pointed it out but it was on the other side of the plane... argh! It used to fly over our house in Lewisville every night at about 10:30pm and would rattle the walls... pretty freaky!

Another funny: One time I brought home with me a live scorpion on the plane in a jar (found it sleeping behind the door in my bedroom). I showed it to the flight attendant who was a bit disturbed. Don't think I would be able to get it through security today ;) (The humidity of northern NJ in summer killed it within a week)

Airfares were always in the $400-$500 range consitently through the years...

Too funny!
 

Yes, I remember. I was 12 yrs old & my parents and I drove to North Carolina to visit my sister. My parents stayed 1 week & left me behind to enjoy the summer.

Flying home, there was a horrible storm & flights were cancelled from ATL to Ft. Myers. So, here I am, 12 yrs old & stuck in some airport. I'm wondering what to do & suddenly I hear my name being called over the intercom system! My mom had called the airlines & had me paged, found a FA to handle my situation.

The airline put us all on a bus & we drove (seemed like forever!) back to Ft. Myers. I enjoyed the flying part; however, not the bus part! My mom still reminds me that she can find me ANYWHERE!

Travel safe :cool:

reminds of the 'Snakes on a plane' movie... brrrrrr :)

I really can't remember traveling alone for the first time, but I suspect I was an unaccompanied minor on Aloha Airlines flying between Honolulu and Hilo (ITO). No idea of the details, wish I knew more...

Looking back I scored my first upgrade on my first solo flight. I was 21 and had flown LHR PER with a group of fellow travel agents who were the most boring bunch. We were been hosted for two weeks touring Western Australia by the tourist board and they whinged and whined their way around the whole state. it was too hot, they missed their Mum, they missed their dog, they didn't want to go sightseeing because they were tired-complete and utter embarassment most of them. I had already arranged to extend my stay after the trip and fly on to MEL to visit a friend and it was with relief I fled the group on a redeye PER MEL and promptly got upgraded. I'd just come from a huge seafood meal in the city and sat in my nice comfy seat to be presented with.....yet more smoked salmon. Can't remember the airline-it wasn't AN it was the *other* Oz domestic carrier. Ultimately I then flew standby to SYD -that was AN -on the spur of the moment before flying Y SYD LHR on QF. Never ever again will I fly between LON and Australia without a stopover-it wasn't so much the flight as the jetlag. Took me about 2 weeks to recover as I arrived home Sunday lunchtime and was back at work Monday morning and my boss took the next 3 days off leaving me all her work to do as well as my own.
However I throughly enjoyed flying solo and still enjoy it today-probably more so as it's about the only place on the planet to escape mobile phones :)

1963
 

One of my first flights alone, if not the first, was from BFI (not SEA) to Ephrata, Washington, on November 22, 1963. I was in boarding high school near Seattle and went home for Thanksgiving break. I got off the DC3, Chiclets chewing gum and all, with my mother meeting me and telling me about JFK being shot.

It was 1993
 

I remember my first flight alone was in December 1993. I stayed a bit longer at my grandparents in LA while my brother and parents went home. It was on a Southwest 737. Ever since I have been traveling alone. I was 9. The biggest trip alone was from JFK-TLV when I was 12 on a TWA 747. It was fun and I got upgraded to first class.

Will never forget it.
January 18 1955, Cartagena to Medellin. Nice two-engine propjob Rutas Aereas SAM. I was 18 taking a job as a Cook in the then Hotel Nutibara in Medellin Colombia.
Getting on this thing was something else. A "puddlejumper", into the clouds and out of them, between mountain tops and just over some palms.
And all this after 52 days on a barely 6,000 ton freighter, traveling from Germany.
Surprise, surprise ... Maine is nice.:rolleyes:

Yeap. Got stuck in San Diego when I was 18 yrs old (trying to get back to WI. had no cash or credit card. Was bumped off a flight when security screener told me bag was too big to board ( note I boarded 5 flights previous with same bag). Dad had to wire me money to get home.

These days I am far smarter. :)

June 23, 1981. LHR-THR on an IR 747. I was 12.

THR is also known as the 1st Tactical Fighter Base and at the time was quite actively involved in the war against Iraq. At THR, you could see F-4Es taking off and landing and also an assortment of C-130s, F-14As, and other aircraft on the ground.

I do vaguely remember, or at least I think I do. I flew as an unaccompanied minor at least once, and maybe twice. If it was twice, I'm 99% sure the first time was on New York Air, and it was EWR to I think DCA. I had flown before a couple times, so that wasn't particularly novel, and I was leaving from a relative's house and being picked up by my parents, or one of them anyway. And I don't think there was even an intermediate stop, certainly no connection. I don't recall my age, maybe 12, 13, somewhere around there. This would put it around 1983, 1984. Didn't know much about plane types at that point. I was more excited than scared to get on a plane, at least at first.

I do remember clearly how the gate agents botched the boarding passes. Somewhere along the way they spaced it and gave me the stub that belonged to the other unaccompanied minor on the flight. I got down to the plane, handed them the stub, and they went oh, now look at this. They thought that not only was seat 1A broken, but they had two of us assigned to it! I recall insisting I had seat 1E (the other window), but they had kept the boarding stub and said no, I was wrong. Whatever. Eventually I got my right stub, and I recall there being nobody in the middle seat next to me and maybe nobody in the aisle either, with the other girl sitting in 1B across the aisle. Something like that.

After that, I wasn't so excited with the flight ;), but it was uneventful once we got going.

Without anyone, not even my sister:
Air Canada to Toronto, I was 15. I went to visit a friend...
We were on the runway for almost 3 hours...not fun!

Dec. 31, 1977.

I had been skiing in Jackson Hole, WY with relatives from back East. There was a terrible cold snap that gave Jackson Hole the coldest temperatures in WY recorded history up to that point (-49F with no wind chill). Everyone got rerouted and I flew back to LAX via DEN or SLC (can't remember, but it was on CO) by myself, at age 14.

Mid-flight, we were told we were making an emergency landing at LAS due to routine mechanical difficulties, but it was actually because some loon phoned in a bomb threat! Pretty scary as I was sitting next to a young woman who had just gotten engaged, and was on the verge of losing it. The descent was normal, but as we approached, we could see a bunch of yellow things moving around on the ground. Turned out to be several fire trucks...not encouraging! Once on the ground, quarantine, no food, no drinks, no bathroom as I recall, FBI questioning, the whole works.

Arrived at LAX 6+ hours late (1am New Years morning), with my parents completely freaked out. They had been told about a series of mechanical difficulties prompting the delay, making them suspicious that we had crashed since the delays were so long. Finally, an LAPD officer (his kid was on the flight solo like me) was at the gate counter with them, and flashed his badge to the GA to get the real story. I also remember my 18 year old brother fuming that "I had ruined" his New Year's Eve. :rolleyes:

duplicate post.

My first (and only) completely alone flight was when I was 20 and in college. August 1995. I flew a commuter from West Lafayette, IN to ORD so I could make an emergency trip to visit my husband. I was pregnant with our first child at the time, so I suppose I wasn't really completely alone ;)
Just a little less than a year prior there had been a crash (on Halloween night 1994) of an american eagle flight between IND and ORD, so I was a bit nervous about the whole solo flight thing, especially in a wee little commuter jet.
When we arrived in the Chicago area, there was some kind of weather issue so we were slightly delayed in landing. It was a very bumpy landing and we had to park out a ways from the gate and walk in because there were alot of flights that were grounded at the gates. We ended up arriving at a different gate than expected.