To Maui ToMorrow?

   This is our day to go to Maui.

   We will fly the Eagle around 2 p.m. for a short flight from San Diego to LAX, transfer to American for our Maui flight arriving by 8 p.m., pick up our car and spend the night at the Kihei Holiday in condo 106.

    We have time to drive through and explore San Diego Old Town, have lunch and get to the airport with plenty of time to spare. Old Town is a gentrified area which used to be a warehouse district. It is loaded with restaurants. Picking one was not easy. The winner was Jim Croce's. We had a relaxed lunch and then Tom dropped us off at the airport with plenty of time to check in and clear security . Had we known what our future had in store for us, we'd have had him take us to LAX.

    We checked our bags in, picked up our boarding passes, went through security and stopped at the little snack area for a beverage and some stuff for the plane. After about a half hour, we heard our names called and went to the counter. They told us the plane was delayed and we had to go back downstairs to pick up our checked bags and catch a shuttle if we were to make our next flight in LAX.

    After some delay, we joined a half dozen other folks in a van to Los Angeles. The driver apparently spoke no English. He was on the phone quite a bit of the trip speaking Spanish. He dropped us off at the terminal quite a ways from the American check in. I guess we should have known that we had to go to the Eagle desk but we didn't and no one told us. After trying to talk to the American folks, we wound up at Eagle and had our bags checked and were told to go up the escalator and get in line for security. I asked about a chair and the supervisor person told us "You don't have time!" We went up and got in line. I asked the folks ushering us about a chair and they said they'd check. About 10 minutes later we got one. The fellow was great. He pulled us out of line and expedited our trip through security and on to our gate.

As we arrived, we saw an aircraft pushing away. It was our flight. The gals at the desk were great. They gave us boarding passes for the next morning flight, vouchers for hotel rooms, vouchers for meals and sent us down to the special shuttle which would take us to the Crowne Plaza. There was one just up the street but we drove right past it and on to the one in San Pedro, 30 minutes away. We checked in, the room was nice, we went to dinner, it was fine, the voucher covered $24.

We noticed a couple at a nearby table who had their bags with them. I overheard enough to get the impression they were in the same boat. It turned out that they were indeed. They also were going to Maui from San Diego. They told us they had called for the morning shuttle to pick them up at 5. We'd planned on 6 but figured that if that was when the van was going to be here, we'd better be on it. I called the service from our room and they knew nothing about a 5 o'clock shuttle, it was coming at 6.

The other problem I had to work on was our rental car. I had rented it through Capital One using the rewards program. They went through Travelocity to arrange for a car from Thrifty. The paperwork said that they would hold the car until 11 AM Monday, we weren't going to get in until after 1 o'clock. I called Thrifty in Kahului. They couldn't do anything, I'd have to call their main office. Thrifty central referred me to Travelocity. I tried Travelocity, they sent us to Capital One which was closed for the weekend. Oh well tomorrow is another day.