We all like to complain, and my top topic for complaint is traveling. I love the destinations, I love the people I meet, I just can’t stand getting there. Normally I am a positive guy but there is something about travel, and in particular flying, that really gets right up my nose.
Here are my top 10 Travel Gripes:
- Getting up early – Why is it that business travel nearly always means waking at some ungodly hour like 4am? Who is able to function properly at that time? This means glugging back ten coffees just to remember your own name, let alone location of your passport, then attempting to sneak around the house like a zombie-ninja. Of course this sets us off to a grumpy start that only gets worse.
- Driving to the airport – It is like goverment, as well as our taxes, wants to extract maximum pain in return for our roads. Traffic jams, people driving at 5mph just to stare at the guy who has been pulled over for having a dim break light, or road works with nobody actually doing any work on them. We know it is going to be like this so we leave ourselves even more time outside of the “must be at check in a gajillion hours early” before our flight just in case.
- Check-in times – And what is up with that? A flight to Paris from our local airport is 55minutes. But we have to spend an hour and a half getting to the airport, two hours IN the airport, then when we land, another hour getting OUT of the airport. Sometimes I think it would be quicker to walk.
- Airport parking – Or should I say, Airport NOT parking. Which means parking two miles from the terminal and worrying about your car the whole time you are away.
- Luggage weight restrictions – You finally get to the check in desk only to find your spare laptop battery puts you 1kg over the weight limit, all the while you are starring at the Fat Family to either side of you who pay no penalty for their burger-crammed bodies amounting to more than the combined weight of the entire luggage hold.
- Security checks – Do they really think the bad guys are that stupid? Really? Making a nine year old take off their shoes is helping keep us safe? While the guy in the boiler suit gets waved through past the desk with all his power tools and a vicious-looking stanley knife. Plus the “war on fluids” means I am not allowed my plastic bottle of water … but right the other side of that x-ray machine I can buy big assed bottles of booze, a full set of kitchen knives, or a fancy swiss army knife containing everything you need to dismantle the blooming airplane.
- Waiting … waiting ... – Nuff said
We wait ... and we wait ...
- Last minute passengers – Oh but some folks don’t wait. They get on just as the door is about to be closed, while the staff put out the tenth call for their wherabouts, delaying the rest of us, then complain about their seat, that their group is being split up, and that there is nowhere to put their ten bags of duty free … which leads to …
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Luggage Compartment Wars
Luggage compartment wars – Everyone else has neatly and fairly arranged the storage space, but there is always some jerk who needs to wedge his military style backpack, ten cases of Stella Artois, and his ton of Marlboro RIGHT ABOVE YOUR HEAD. Oh and that souvenir artwork, CD collection and expensive camera you put in the bag you carefully placed in the compartment? Don’t think it will be protected by your coat and other soft materials. That guy is going to ram his gear into that cramped space so much that all your stuff will be ground into tiny shards.
- Other passengers - It is not just the late boarders and storage hoarders that make me mad. It is the people who use other passengers as free child care, the folks who take up the space of four seats meaning you get the space of .25 of a seat, with zero arm-rest privelages, and the folks who leave a toxic stink in the washroom 2feet from your nose. Oh, and the guy who thinks the comedy show is so hull-ari-ous he has to guffaw at the top of his lungs and repeat … every … frikkin … line.
*Sigh* thanks for letting me get all that off my chest 
What are your least favorite aspects of traveling? Please share yours in the comments …
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
I think mine is the food….if you can call it that. It’s overpriced and inedible. I remember ordering a coffee once and the taste and flavour burnt a hole in my tounge that took a week to heal…
Oh, and also baggage collection! Why do people push in and crowd around that yellow line???
Snotty steward(ess)s who look at you as if you just made an indecent proposal – when all you asked is if you may please have a refill of your plastic cup of Coke!
Dr.Mani
Prior to 911 I’d have called you names for being a travel wimp with a post like this. Remember the glory days of travel?
The drive is still the drive, can’t get past that. I lived near Orly airport and found that I could get my parking ticket, then drive in the exit so I was right next to an airport entrance where people were only leaving – my walk in was people-free. And leaving was not a bother because I was a 30 second walk from the airport exit and parked within 3 spaces of the parking exit.
I am a million mile flyer, so I’d get up at 5h30 for a 7h00 flight. Get to the airport (and this was before the online check in) and walk to the front of the line, flash a card and a smile and get my economy seat upgraded to at least business.
Luggage restrictions? Before 911 I never heard of them. I once flew from Paris to DC with 10 full (very full) suitcases and we were only 2 travelers. The check in guy just said something like “You sure pack light.” Maybe, just maybe, I got away with all that luggage because I was active duty in the US Marine Corps and the travel was my change of duty station. (People love Marines, as long as you keep them on a base with a sign at the entrance “Only open in case of war” ).
Security checks? Before 911 I got into an argument that because the lady checking me thought my knife was too big. It was longer than the width of her hand. That used to be the ‘rule’ about a pocket knife. If the blade was not longer that the width of your hand you could carry it. I have wide hands.
Waiting. Just didn’t happen unless I was stuck doing a transfer.
Last minute passengers – well, that was actually me. Sorry.
Luggage compartment wars? Lets go back to that million mile flyer thing and having everyone’s gold card. I’d just get on and hand my bag to the stew and pick it up on leaving. Never really knew where it went to, never really cared.
Other passengers is the only thing that has not changed before and after 911. I had a LA to Frankfort flight with a 400 pound person on my right hand side. I also had a 400 pound person on my left hand side. I ended up standing the full 14 hours?) flight. When the stew told my I should sit down I pointed to my seat and you could not see it. Tubby1 was brushing elbows with Tubby2. That was THE longest flight I ever had.
Before 911 being a frequent flyer had advantages. Real advantages. When my company said I had to start using BA for the Paris/London flight I was a bit bummed. I didn’t have a BA card at all, so I figured I was be forced to sit with the unwashed masses. My first check in (the only time I stood in line with BA before 911) was cool. I asked if they took my Air France gold card, or US Air, or JAL or Air Lingus. I had the highest card for all of these and was stuck in economy. The nice lady behind the counter moved me to business, gave me a card to fill out and the first Frequent Flyer card I had with BA was their highest level.
Business lounges. I’d walk into the lounge which I saw first and hand over all my cards and tell the receptionist to take their pick. I’d get in to places where I didn’t have a card.
If I was going to a lounge where I had a card, I’d bring in 2 or 3 fellow travelers and no one would question me. I even brought in a lady with her 2 kids once, because they had a long layover. The lounge was better than the terminal and the food was free.
I really miss the pre-911 travel. Today I’d be lucky to not have a body cavity search before using the toilet.
Wow Richard – thanks for the comment! So you’re saying that in the old days, apart from winding up Chris by pushing your way to the front of the queue
, travel in the ‘old days’ was a brilliant experience.
And now, well, it’s rubbish and frustrating…surely the destination’s worth it, isn’t it?!
@Dr.Mani – You are such an upbeat guy, I can’t see you being annoyed for long
@McLaughlin – We should promote that as a post! Do you want to write for a travel blog?
This may not be directly related to the act of ‘travelling’ but it is a travel gripe to do with hotels.
I hate that every hotel room has a TV in it! I specifically don’t own a TV so that I won’t waste hours of my night watching terrible reality shows – I’d actually pay more for a room with no tele in it…
I think I may be in the minority here though…
@halsed
Why does the plane always hit turbulence just as you get a hot drink?
When your hold luggage gets to the carousel, how come one bag arrives pretty quickly and the second bag thirty minutes later?
Why is there always so much unattended luggage hanging around the carousel area and nobody seems to worry at that stage……
My pet hate is people who rush the gate when you, and a dozen others, are already worried that you won’t get through in time, and then proceed to have a loud, violent argument at the desk about why it’s not their fault they missed their flight, and how everyone else should be put on hold, and finding them the first available flight should be priority.
This is not my imagination running wild. Happened to me last time I was in New York. I was so happy when a North Carolinian (bless ‘em) told him ‘what the $#*& is this?’ He was unrepentant though. Some people really do think the world revolves around them.
Immigration officials who treat people like aliens
Airports with poor wi-fi; bad bookshops and no retailer selling fresh fruit or healthy snacks!
Cheers
@Anita_Lobo
@Anita_Lobo I feel your pain on all of those things as well! My kingdom for a fresh apple!!