Another roadblock... Ugh

Things were looking good. I had the COVID tests scheduled for this weekend, the testing site was approved by the Chinese consulate and I had flights from Air France booked for Tuesday evening, flying through Paris and on to Beijing.

Evidently, it was all too good to be true.

This morning I received an e-mail from Air France asking me to upload some travel document information to their web site to prepare for my trip. So, I clicked on the link and it took me to my trip page and the notice at the top of the page said that the flight from Boston to Paris has been cancelled. 

Now, the flight is just more than a week away and I had received absolutely no notice from Air France that the flight had been cancelled. The e-mail that was sent was simply a request for travel documentation information. Nowhere in the e-mail did it say anything about the flight being cancelled. After paying a lot of money for the flight, I am stuck in a situation of trying to figure out just what the next step is.

I contacted the people I have been dealing with in making the reservations on special flights to and from Beijing (they are Beijing-based, so it's the middle of the night there) and I am hoping to hear from them sometime this evening when they get into work. I have no idea if a rescheduling is possible or if I am on my own to find a way to Paris now.

The problem lies in that my COVID tests have to be timed for a certain period of time before my arrival in Beijing and if I leave New Hampshire too early and am forced to change my testing times, the tests. may be too late. And if I leave New Hampshire too late, I wouldn't make it to Paris to get on the special flight to Beijing.

I am really hoping to have answers to this ridiculous situation by tomorrow. This is the second flight I've had for this trip that has been cancelled and I can't wrap my head around the fact that there wasn't a single e-mail sent saying the flight had been cancelled. Nothing. If I hadn't gone online to enter the requested information, I wouldn't have known until I went to check in.

This whole experience is starting to feel more and more like the return trip from Tokyo this summer that resulted in delays, lost luggage, multiple trips through customs and an unexpected overnight stay. And that's not a good thing.

At this rate, who knows if I'll ever get to see the inside of The Beijing 2022 Media Center. Photo from Olympics.com.