eliminating stress at the airport

This You Tube video, entitled "Stupidly Long Unnecessary Queue at Heathrow Airport," illustrates the issue I'm writing about. Like many of my articles, this was prompted by a question posed in a post on fodors.com. What time should she leave her Paris hotel to catch a flight departing Paris CDG at 10:20 a.m. The advice came back — depart your hotel at 6 a.m. She replied, asking whether it would be safe to leave at 7 a.m.? Answer: NO!!!

Here's my personal approach, knowing that others prefer to live dangerously! I strategize to minimize stress when I travel. When planning my departure time, I take into account everything that can go wrong — including traffic jams, unfamiliarity with the airport and its procedures, and long lines for check-in, baggage drop-off, security, and passport control. I assume the worst scenario and take that into account when planning my departure time.

Some tips for dealing with logistical stress.

(1) Leave yourself plenty of time! I don't mind waiting at the front of a line when I'm early, but I hate waiting at the back of a line when I'm late.

(2) Consider the option of public transportation during rush hour. I often take BART to the San Francisco airport to avoid a drive over the Bay Bridge during rush hour, especially if there won't be enough passengers in the car to use the carpool lanes.

(3) Checked baggage and running late? Use the skycaps outside the terminal doors. MUCH shorter lines, and even if you tip $1 or more per bag, that's a small amount to pay to eliminate stress.

(4) Fly in Business Class or First. You'll enjoy much shorter check-in lines and have priority access through the security lines.

(5) Get Global Entry which includes TSA Pre-Check. The latter gets you into a shorter, quicker line and spares you the inconvenience of taking off your shoes and jackets and removing your laptops and bag of liquids from your carry on. Global Entry saves you from queueing at US Immigration on your return and gets you into an expedited Customs line.

(6) Airport lounges typically provide a haven of sanity when you do get there early and have time to burn. Instead of grabbing a bolted-down seat by the gate, head to your airline's lounge (or use a Priority Pass Lounge). Many credit cards provide lounge access. American Express Platinum gets the cardmember free access into a Delta lounge (or into an Amex Centurion Lounge at a number of airports). There are credit cards that provide American and United lounge access ... and a Priority Pass Select card.

(7) VIP airport services can also save you time and stress where available. At Paris Charles De Gaulle (which the original question was about), you can get both a departure service (meet-and-greet curbside; fast-track through check-in, immigration, and security; lounge access; and escort to the boarding gate) and arrival service (meet-and-greet at the gate; fast-track through immigration and customs, assistance with luggage, and escort to your waiting limo).

copyright (c) 2017 by Ourisman Travel LLC. All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell Travel. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.

how to ENJOY your vacation

When I travel, I obsess over details. This is not how I choose to be - it simply is who I am - and I admit: it can take the fun out of travel. Each day can become a series of challenges:

• planning a logical sequence of activities
  
• deciding when to leave the hotel
  
• determining the logistics of getting from place to place
  
• finding ticket booths, securing tickets
  
• getting the most out of each visit to an attraction
  
• researching a good place to have lunch
  
• etc., etc., etc.

Every time you go to an airport, train station, or car rental office, there are more details to obsess over. Handling logistics, especially in an unfamiliar place, is stressful.

I want to tell you about a different way to travel: using on-sites (private tour guides) when you visit new and unfamiliar destinations. Pictured at the left is Angela, a Virtuoso on-site in Bangkok, Thailand, who ensured that my visit to her city surpassed my expectations.

Virtuoso has a world-wide network of the best local on-sites in virtually every country on earth. Licensed tour guides, these local residents are experts in the art of helping you explore their country and understand their culture. Angela planned two days of sightseeing for us, customized for our interests. Everything went totally smoothly because she is a true expert at what she does. I never had to plan, obsess about, or sweat the details. My job was simply to sit back and enjoy the experience!

And on our last day in Bangkok, Angela met us in the hotel lobby, went with us to the airport, got us to the right counter, took care of our seat assignments, and stayed with us up until we went through security. It was the least stressful, most fun vacation I have ever had.

Travel beyond your expectations - that's my agency's tag line - and I've just told you the secret: using local on-sites. Contact a Virtuoso luxury travel consultant to take your next trip to the next level.

Virtuoso luxury travel consultant (Search here on Google)


copyright (c) 2007 by David J. Ourisman. All rights reserved. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.
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managing travel stress -- consider a tour

As I wrote two weeks ago, travel can be stressful. Nearly everyone experiences travel stress, but the fact is that different things stress out different people. Today's column concerns the stress of coping with the unfamiliar.

Travel is exciting! It is exhilarating to step off the plane after a long international flight and find yourself in some far-off and exotic place: Italy, China, Vietnam, wherever! But once you make it through customs and to the front doors of the airport, you face the first of a multitude of very practical questions. How do I get some of the local currency? What is the best way to get taken from the airport to my hotel ... without getting taken? What's a fair price to pay? Am I expected to give a tip? How much is appropriate?

Of course, once you reach your hotel (assuming you have a reservation), you have the formalities of check-in to deal with. While most desk clerks at nice hotels have a good command of English, you may have difficulty understanding someone's accent. You may have questions about the rate on the form you are asked to sign; is it the same price that you booked? You may feel stressed out communicating your questions to the desk clerk, fearful that you won't be able to express yourself clearly.

You will face, at least two times a day, the most practical of questions: Where are we to have lunch or dinner? How can we find a good restaurant where the locals eat, some place whose menu represents real value for your converted dollars, not some tourist trap that dishes out plates of ordinary food to hundreds of tourists each day?

And, then, there's the whole reason you're there: What should we see today? How do we get there? How do I buy a bus or metro ticket? Is there a weekly pass that the locals know about that represents a really good value? Is there a good time of day to get to a particular attraction? Are there tricks we should know to avoid huge lines?

Some people are energized by living spontaneously and are perfectly comfortable exploring, taking wrong turns, and occasionally messing up. That's part of the appeal of foreign independent travel for such folks. Sometimes those "wrong turns" turn out to be serendipitous discoveries that are remembered as the surprising highlights of your whole trip.

While some travelers thrill in this aspect of the adventure, others do not. They stress out at everything I have described above. So I have a suggestion for such travelers: consider a tour. I know, I know ... tours have a bad name. We all have this image of busloads of tourists being driven around a city, hurried through museums, and herded into restaurants. That's not the kind of tour I'm talking about.

I would recommend seriously considering some upscale tour companies such as Backroads. All your logistics will taken care of; you'll never have to figure out how to get to the next place on your itinerary. You'll stay in very nice, sometimes hard-to-book properties in your budget range that the tour company has worked with for years. You won't have to drag your luggage around; when you leave your bags outside your door in the morning, they will magically reappear that very afternoon in your next hotel room. And you won't need to worry about finding places to eat; you'll dine at some of the best restaurants in the area, places that the casual tourist might never find. With some companies, you can order anything you want off the menu; the biggest challenge is passing on the desserts!

You'll have the services of terrific local tour guides, so you won't have to spend each night researching the next day's activities; your days will be well planned. Your admissions to museums and other attractions are taken care of. The group is small enough that you never feel regimented; you're free to go off on your own, and usually they leave one afternoon and one dinner free for you to spend with your travelling companion ... with tons of suggestions if you want them. A well-run tour company takes the hassle out of travel.

So if you love the idea of traveling to strange and exotic places but stress out over the details of being there, consider an escorted tour. They sweat the details so that you can just enjoy your vacation!

Photograph courtesy of Backroads.

travel agent consultant stress tour Backroads exotic anxiety sightseeing restaurant hotel logistics