23 Jun 2023
When I booked my round-trip ride with Mears, they asked for my return flight information and then assigned me a pick-up time based off that. For my 0830 flight, they wanted to pick me up at 0515. No way. Not happening. Even allowing an hour for additional pick-ups and drive time to the airport, I do not need to be picked up over 3 hours before my flight. So I looked up other departing flights and picked one that left a little after 9 and sure enough, my pick-up time moved to 0545- still early, but I will happily accept an extra half hour of sleep.
I assumed the big Mears bus would come around and pick us up, but I got the tracking information for this van instead:
My ride’s almost here!
Another family boarded with me and we had one other pick-up on this route, but as we were leaving the 2nd stop, dispatch radioed and asked if we could make one more stop to get a group who missed their scheduled pick-up. Even with the added stop, I made it through security and to my gate a little over an hour after the van picked me up. While I appreciate them being cautious, I knew I didn’t need nearly as much time as they tried to give me.
I thought things were going well- boarding started on time and moved efficiently… I should have known it was too good to be true. Storms were once again rolling through the area so we got hit with a weather delay and there were 20 planes in front of us waiting to take off. To make matters worse, the AC in our plane was struggling to keep up and things started getting toasty. I’m sure it would have been fine once we were in the air, but with the long line of planes waiting to take off, the pilot opted to take us back to the gate and have the AC checked out (and top off our fuel as we’d been idling for a while we waited).
I knew we’d probably be here for a bit when they started letting people off the plane. On the plus side, fewer people meant the plane wasn’t nearly as warm as it had been and the people in my row left, so I opted to just hang out on the plane (I had a stack of crossword puzzles in my bag that kept me busy).
And every half hour or so, I’d get a text, optimistically saying my flight would be leaving in the next half hour:
Finally, 2.5 hours after our scheduled departure time, we got the OK from the tower and maintenance found nothing wrong the the AC, so we were cleared to take off!
Farewell, Orlando!
This trip had more delays that I’ve ever experienced in my previous travels, but despite the long waits and the iffy weather (and the loss of my sunglasses!), it was a pretty fun trip!
Edit: I got an email today (1 Aug) from Sun Country with a $50 voucher to put toward my next flight. I didn’t file a complaint or anything after all the delays, but maybe someone else on my flight(s) did? Regardless, it was a pleasant surprise!