A comedy of errors
Trip Start
Dec 22, 2009
1
2
7
Trip End
Dec 29, 2009
Where I stayed
Genoa, Italian Riviera, Italy
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
I took the shuttle from the central station to the Malpensea airport. There are 2 terminals and the bus dropped me off at terminal 2 just in time to meet the plane. It was now 8:10 and the sign showed no information regarding their flight. After waiting in the terminal for about an hour, I decided to check the other terminal, which I was basically unaware of until this point even though the terminal I was in was the local EU side of the airport. I should have been clued in by the Ryan air and Easy jet flights coming in. I took the airport shuttle across to the newer and larger terminal for international flights. It was actually about a 10 minute ride. Guess what? There was still no plane. I called my friends in Rome and asked them to check online only to find out there was a 7.5 hour delay. I had seen this on the monitor but the flight number didn't match my records and I found it difficult to accept that that was the correct information. It turns out the numbers had changed because the flights were changed from Delta to Alitalia.
This airport looks very new and modern but maybe so modern that shops and entertainment areas have not been developed yet and it was quite barren. So, I checked my bag at the bag check locker and took a shuttle train into Milan and took a 2 hour bus tour of the city center.
After lunch I made my way back to the airport for a second try. This time the plane came. It was very nice to see my family when they arrived. It has been quite some time. So we made our way to the train station where we were to catch a train to Brig Switzerland. I used perfect Italian to ask for help and we bought 4 tickets to Brig. When we asked were the train left from, we were directed to the track where a regional train awaited.
Here’s the kick. The sign was marked “gen/brig” and we boarded after verifying the train went to Brig. BUT, there is a “Brignola” near Genoa, and a Brig near Geneva. The train abbreviations are the same: Gen/Brig and we ended up going south to Genoa instead of north to Switzerland. When we arrived to “Brig” after asking many people where we were, and being told Brig, I decided to ask a cab how much it would cost to go to Zermatt and found out we had made a big mistake. At this point I found out that we were 500 km in the wrong direction and it would cost 900euros to go direct to Zermatt by cab. We would have to go back to Milan and start over from there.... Everyone was tired and we decided to stay overnight and try again in the morning. Luckily, there was a hotel with a large room available (and a bar where my brother and I decided to have a drink before bed). To say the least, it was a comedy of errors the entire day, but I felt really bad for making the mistake and I fear I’ll never live it down.
