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CARLENE CARTER – FAROE ISLANDS AND NORWAY FESTIVALS – TUESDAY AND WEDNESDAY, JULY 12TH AND 13TH, 2022:
Not even where to start on this road report!
Traveling to the Faroe Islands and Norway again but this time with Carlene Carter. She performs at the huge G!Festival in the Faroes and the Norsk Country Treff in Norway.
Everyone met at the airport as scheduled and our Delta flight to JFK departed on time. The best routing was a 7 hour layover at JFK but we got everyone into the Delta Lounge. I managed to get quite a bit of work done during that time. The others took advantage of the free food and drinks!
We boarded and departed on time and it was a “short” trip compared to my other trips to Europe. The flight was less than 7 hours and we arrived early. Easy trip with horrible movie selection, so I slept for 3 hours. That was the end of our good luck on this trip.
When we entered baggage claim, our jaws dropped. We were barely able to access the conveyor belt because there were carts everywhere filled with luggage. All the luggage was “lost” luggage for SAS. The SAS pilots are on strike. We only had one flight in this trip booked with SAS and we immediately changed it to Norwegian Airlines once we heard about the strike. I should have taken a photo of it. While we were waiting, several people came into baggage claim and walked from cart to cart looking for their lost bags. I never saw anyone find one.
Once all the bags came out, we were missing one of Carlene’s bags and one bag for Al (musician). Believe it or not, there was NOWHERE to file a claim! The only airline in baggage claim where a claim could be filed was SAS and their partners. It took a long time to find someone who could help us but we were finally told to go to the 7-11 outside baggage claim and look for a “screen”. We found the “screen” and it listed Menzies Aviation as the contact for Delta lost luggage. We were told that we had to call the phone number listed and someone would tell us “where” and “when” to meet them!!! We called and I held for 45 minutes and never got an answer.
We decided to go to the Atlantic Airways counter and see if “maybe” someone was there and we could check out bags. All day I had been receiving messages from “Tripit” saying our flight was delayed from a 7:05 pm departure to a 9:30 pm departure. Then as we were walking to their counter, it changed to an 11:00 pm departure. I kept checking the Atlantic website but it did not show the delays. We had landed Copenhagen at around 11 am and knew we had a long layover but never dreamed it would extend to 12 hours. Someone was at the Atlantic counter and allowed us to check our bags. He confirmed that the flight was delayed until 11 pm that night. Evidently, there had been bad weather the day before and all the flights were cancelled. That is normal for the Faroe Islands and usually happens most of the times I’m here. But, this time, Atlantic was taking care of all the passengers whose flights were delayed the previous day before honoring any flights for passengers today!
Carlene and the group went to the Clarion Hotel connected to the airport and ordered food. I tried to get some more information before Jamie and I walked over but it was useless. I call my Delta Diamond Line while the others were eating and they really couldn’t help me because our bags were only tagged to Copenhagen and then we were supposed to pick them up and recheck with Atlantic Airways. They did confirm that the bags would arrive Copenhagen on the same flight tomorrow.
I got in touch with someone at the festival who put me in touch with a “Luggage Service” and that company turned out to be awesome. They are going to meet the flight today and retrieve the bags, store them overnight, and deliver them to the Norwegian Airlines counter when we arrive there for check in on Friday. It’s just too much of a risk to try to have them fly the two bags to the Faroes on Thursday. Carlene and the musician are just going to have to borrow clothing for the next 2 days until we can get back to Copenhagen.
Carlene got “day rooms” at the Comfort Hotel for her group so they could at least get some sleep before flying to the Faroes late tonight. Everyone crashed and I got a room and went to work. Lots of things going on with other tours that had to be handled. I walked back over to the airport at around 8 pm to check on things and use the “voucher” that Atlantic airlines gave us for a meal. Unfortunately, the one restaurant in the terminal was closed so I ended up getting a snack at the 7-11! The new departure time on the board was for 11:50 pm! I met a nice man who was also on our same flight. His wife books the children’s entertainment at the G!Festival. He gave me some good information about what was going on and said he felt sure we would be flying out at midnight tonight because the weather was now good in the Faroes.
I went back to the hotel and we all left at 10 pm to walk over to the terminal. Since we had already checked out bags, all we had to do was go through security and to the gate. I was concerned that since we had checked our bags at around 1 pm, they would not be on our flight. I asked the gate agent to check and make SURE they were loaded. He typed about 3 keystrokes on the computer and said “Yes, they are!”. I knew he had not really checked because it takes much longer than that to check bag status. Nothing I could do because he was the only airline employee working.
The flight was full and it was a 2 hour trip. Atlantic Airways does NOT have Wi-Fi which was very frustrating! When we landed, our bags arrived but Carlene’s guitar and Dave’s bass were missing!!! We waited a long time after all the luggage came out and finally had the Customs Inspector go back outside to see if there were any items that were going to come in on the “oversize belt”. He confirmed that there was nothing left on the plane. Again, nowhere to file a claim because everyone had gone home. It was after 1 am by that time.
Our driver met us with two vehicles and we drove to the hotel. It’s one of the newer hotels in Torshavn and I’ve never stayed here before. It’s really nice and they even had our sandwiches and salads waiting for us when we arrived as we had ordered. I was able to get in touch with the festival and let them know about the missing instruments. They made arrangements for us to “borrow” what was needed but said they would begin checking for the lost pieces first thing Thursday morning.
I decided to go to bed at 4 am and sleep for 4 hours then get up and work on all the day’s problems. I am so thankful that Carlene and her entire group are so nice, easy and flexible to work with. Everyone kept their sense of humor which definitely was needed!
A word of advice – do not travel anywhere unless you absolutely cannot avoid it. More airlines are going to be striking in the next few weeks. Lindsey is escorting Tenille Arts and her group to Bahrain and Kuwait this weekend. The group is currently in the UK and have been without their bags and equipment for 5 days! Hopefully everything will show up before they depart to Bahrain on Sunday! Jude THURSDAY, JULY 14TH – FINALLY MADE IT TO THE FAROE ISLANDS: It feels like we have been traveling for a week! Woke up to the message that the flight from JFK was delayed by two hours so it will be around 2 pm before we know if the bags made it from JFK to Copenhagen. I have spent all morning trying to check our group in for flights on 3 different airlines tomorrow – Atlantic Airways to Copenhagen, Norwegian Airlines to Oslo, and Wideroe Airlines to Sandane. It was a nightmare. The airlines had changed all our aisle and window seats AGAIN and has us all sitting together with several of us in middle seats. The airlines would not allow me to change on their website or their app and no one answers their phones. I finally had to get the festival to help again! Had to go to the venue for sound check at 2:30 pm and it’s a really cool location. The drive from the island we are on is now through a long tunnel and cuts the drive time to about 20 minutes. The festival is in Gota (actually shortened from Nordragota) in the Village of Eysturoy, Faroe Islands. I met all the people that I have been working with via email and was surprised that none of them hated me after all the trouble we have had with our flights and lost luggage. All super nice people. Sound check was quick and painless. We were back at the hotel at 4:30 pm and only had time for a very quick dinner. The main restaurant wasn’t open, so we had food from the limited menu at the hotel Café. The “stew” today was chicken and it was terrific. We departed back to the venue at 6:15 pm. The stage is right on the water so the setting is beautiful. It started raining (which is normal for the Faroe Islands) just as Carlene started signing but no one left. Then about halfway through her set, a beautiful rainbow appeared that stretched over the water and to the edge of the stage. Posting photos on Facebook of this. We were surprised to see so many “younger” people in the audience all enjoying her music. There were also a lot of “line dancers”. I got to see my friends Tummas and Allan (from the Country Festival). I hate that I had so little time here to spend with either of them. We should have arrived on Tuesday instead of Wednesday and had a day off! Carlene performed for 90 minutes and we left immediately after her set as we have to be in the lobby for a 6 am departure to the airport. OUCH. It’s almost 1 am now and I’ll have to get up at 4 am, so shutting down and will put whatever I missed in this road report in tomorrow’s report. FRIDAY, JULY 15TH (I THINK!) – TRAVELING FROM FAROE ISLANDS TO NORWAY: No one got more than 3 hours sleep. I got 2 hours. It was a 45 minute drive to the airport and a quick check in to Copenhagen because the flight is so short. Flight departed and landed on time. Then we waited over 40 minutes just for the bags to come in! I contacted the Luggage Service that we had hired and they agreed to meet us at the Norwegian check-in counter with the missing bags from Wednesday’s Delta flight. We had a 3 hour layover before the flight to Oslo but one hour was already gone by the time we finally collected all the bags and arrived at the check-in counter. Was happy not to have lost another bag on this flight! I took photos of all the hundreds and hundreds of “lost bags” sitting around everyone in the baggage claim area. Check my Facebook page. Pretty unreal. I guess because SAS pilots are on strike, there’s no way to get the bags to the passengers. The agent at the check-in counter insisted that we check in on the kiosk and print and tag all our bags. I knew it was going to be a problem because of the instruments but she was insistent. Tagging the bags was no problem but once we tried to send the guitars through the conveyor belt, they were rejected. So the ticket agent did have to handle the check in. Thankfully the line for security wasn’t very long and we were able to make it to the gate with a few minutes to spare. Still thankful that we changed our flight from SAS to Norwegian Airlines. It was a really nice plane and had lots of empty seats. Short flight to Oslo where we arrived on time again and all our bags/equipment arrived with us. We collected everything and went to the check in counter to check in for the little prop plane flight on Wideroe Airlines to Sandane. We had a 5 hour layover but again, only had about 3 hours left once we collected bags and rechecked everything and went through customs. Everyone split up for a meal since we had missed lunch and everything would be closed by the time we finally arrived at the hotel tonight. Some of us found a great Asian restaurant with Thai food and noodles. I had about 2 hours to “work” before we boarded the flight to Sandane. I’ve flown the little prop plane many times and it’s always a “turbulent” flight. It was the same today. We flew for about 45 minutes and then make a “stop” for 15 minutes in a tiny village. We arrived Sandane on time but this time, David’s personal suitcase did not make it. It amazes me that besides the 7 of us on the plane, there were only about 10 other people. Yet, they were unable to get all our bags on the flight with us! Although we knew there was nowhere open for food since it was after 10 pm, our “hosts” (Kariannee and John) found a restaurant that could make pizza for us. They dropped us at the hotel where I got everyone checked in and came back with the pizza a few minutes later. I made sure I got in bed “early” for me and got 5 hours sleep. Tomorrow is a busy day with sound check, a two-song acoustic performance at a little church, and the performance tonight. The good news is we don’t’ depart to the Oslo airport until late tomorrow afternoon. We’ll spend the night at the hotel airport and fly home on Monday. |
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