Weather: warm and sunny
7 miles (2731 total)
I got up at 6.25, a little early for my liking. After checking out I snatched a quick bite to eat at the complimentary breakfast in the lobby, and left at 7.20. In order to return the fuel tank full, I made a stop at the last gas station before the line of car hire depots on the road to the airport, then took it into the Alamo depot. All seemed well and I boarded the airport shuttle.
My flight to Washington Dulles International Airport left at 10.30 and was uneventful save for evident problems with the video system, with repeated sound and picture dropouts. Eventually these were sorted, and I settled down to watch ``Enigma'' again, the other movies on offer failing to tempt me. I was a little disappointed to have the film curtailed a couple of minutes before the end as the Boeing 777 began its descent over Virginia.
Arrival was on time, and I made my way across to the departure gate for the onward flight to London, being amused by a bug in the information system manifesting itself in the form of computer code appearing on the departure screens. Finding little else of interest nearby, I settled down to read until boarding commenced.
I was interrupted by a call for volunteers willing to surrender their seats on the flight owing to its being overbooked, and fly back the next day. The compensation was tempting, as was the chance to go to a hotel for the night -- I had been suffering from a headache most of the day and was not overly looking forward to another long flight. I confirmed the details: overnight accommodation at an up-market hotel, all meals included, and six hundred dollars' worth of travel vouchers, more than I had paid for my flights in the first place. This flight was apparently overbooked by forty, making it a rather costly one for United.
Taking them up on the offer, I was send to their customer service desk to join a long queue -- several other flights that day were also overbooked. I spoke to one couple who were professionals at this game, deliberately travelling at busy times and always being first to volunteer to take a later flight. What with compensation vouchers and air miles earned, they did extremely well out of it.
I was rebooked on a flight at 8.00 the next morning, necessitating another early start (particularly after moving forward two timezones), with accommodation at the nearby Hyatt Dulles luxury hotel. I gave a description of my case to aid the handlers in locating it and removing it from my intended flight, and then made my way across the airport to reclaim it. Thankfully this was a painless process despite it being unclear as to exactly where I should look for it
A little less painless was finding where to await the shuttle to the Hyatt, not helped by my having a heavy case in tow. Eventually it appeared and a large load of passengers, mostly in a similar position, were crammed in. It reached the hotel, a few miles from the airport, around 7pm Eastern, to the sound of a brass band playing somewhere in the hotel's conference facilities.
I checked in, had another bout of trouble with swipecard room keys (this was at least the third occasion on the trip I had encountered one which didn't work), and eventually got into my rather splendid room. I made a call home using up most of a pre-pay phone card (still significantly cheaper than calling direct from the hotel phone), then spent a while being entertained by a ``preview'' channel on the hotel's TV system telling me what wonders I could watch if I paid a small fortune for the privilege, as if the other 30 channels were not enough.
I had dinner in the form of a large chicken Caesar salad in the ``Snappers'' restaurant off the hotel lobby, then returned to my room for a little more mindless televisual entertainment before going to bed at 22.40.