The Olympics... and beyond

While I am saying the journey begins, it really began a few years ago, but today, the physical journey begins, as I got my packing done, hopped in my car and headed south to Logan Airport.  Unlike my Tokyo trip earlier this year, instead of hoping that the economy parking was open, I booked a spot ahead of time at the Hampton Inn just north of the airport. It seemed like the best option, as the shuttle runs directly from the hotel to the airport and I didn't need to go all the way in to Logan. I parked my car, got the necessary tag for my dashboard, handed over my keys and hopped on the shuttle to the airport. I presented my COVID test, my vaccination card and my passport at the Air France desk, checked my baggage and got my boarding pass and headed toward security. The security process was about as easy as I've ever had, there was no line and I didn't have to do anything special, so here I sit at the tables at Terminal E waiting on my flight, which is slated to take off at...

So many things have gone wrong over the last few months when it comes to the planning of my trip to Beijing for the Winter Olympics. There was the numerous attempts to send money to pay for the accommodations, which kept getting returned for minor reasons or were held up because of a wrong letter or number somewhere on the application. There was the two cancelled flights that led to a scramble to find a way out of the country. There were the worries that the COVID testing facilities that I had submitted for Chinese consulate approval would not be approved. And there was the worry that after all the work, one of the COVID tests I needed to take before I left would come back positive. After all those things had gone wrong, it was about time that something went right. And this weekend, things went right. First and foremost, the COVID testing provider I chose, On-Site Medical Services, proved to be incredible. They are set up in a trailer in the parking lot at the Mall of New Hampshire and...

There have been a lot of countdowns regarding the Olympics over the course of the last two years, especially since we had a couple different ones for Tokyo with the postponement. Each one has special meaning in one way or the other. For instance, Milan-Cortina recently celebrated 1,500 days until they host the Winter Olympics, which will be coming in 2026. Today's countdown is one week until the Opening Ceremonies for Beijing's Winter Olympics. The official ceremony takes place on Friday at the Bird's Nest, the stadium that served as the home for track and field and the ceremonies of the 2008 Summer Olympics. The other day, I reached out to the great Bill Hancock, who handles all of the high demand tickets for the United States Olympic and Paralympic Team. For those that may not know, our press credentials get us into most of the events that take place at the Olympics. However, there are some events that are deemed 'high demand' by organizers and for those events, i...

Can I buy a jet? Ok, that might be a bit of a stretch, particularly given my financial situation, but at this point, it seems like the safest option to get myself to the Winter Olympics next week. As I noted yesterday, Air France cancelled my flight from Boston to Paris, leaving me without a way to get to the Paris to Beijing flight that was supposed to take me to the Olympics. This marks the second flight I've had cancelled during this process, after my Cathay Pacific flight from Boston to Hong Kong was cancelled a few months ago. At least in that case, I had a few months to make other arrangements. The Air France cancellation happened a week before I was supposed to fly. I made a call to the Air France customer service line this morning, but the person I talked to was not much help. First and foremost, it was almost completely impossible to understand what they were saying, not because of an accent, but because of what seemed like a bad connection or something. However, they coul...

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 i...

Two weeks from today, Tuesday, Feb. 1, an Air France flight will depart from Boston's Logan Airport at 5:20 p.m. If all goes as planned between now and then, I will be on that plane, on my way to Beijing for my third consecutive Winter Olympics experience and my fourth Olympic experience overall. Of course, the important words in that paragraph are "if all goes as planned between now and then." Obviously, this has been the biggest issue over the course of the last few weeks and months as things have not gone as planned at just about any stage of this journey. As reported last week, I was able to secure flights to and from Beijing, thanks to Air France and numerous calls to my credit card company to ensure them that the 4,000-dollar charge on my card was not fraud, despite what it might look like. The flights are secure, the hotel in Beijing is secure and I have entered all the necessary data into the proper web sites so that someone will hopefully be waiting for me to tra...

Last week brought a number of updates as the journey toward the Beijing Olympics continued on toward next month's opening ceremonies. And this week, there's a few updates beyond those. As noted last week, I had reached out to Air France about a possible flight that would conform with what the Beijing organizers are asking for and would still allow me to fly in and out in accordance with when I have accommodations available in Beijing. I had tried a few times to make the payment for this flight, which was not cheap, but had gotten an "unsuccessful" message each time I tried. On Saturday morning, I tried with a different credit card and immediately I got a text from the credit card company warning of a possible fraud situation. I quickly called the number I was provided and spoke with a woman in customer service, who helped guide me through the security process and was able to turn my card back on. She told me to wait a bit before trying the purchase again. Since I had ...

The trip to my fourth Olympics has been a rocky road. There's communication issues regarding money transfers, confusion about what kind of flights we need to take and how to get COVID testing agencies approved by the Chinese government and just a general lack of resources to get the necessary things done. There was a bit of good news in my e-mail inbox when I woke up this morning. As I wrote yesterday, I spent a good chunk of the day dealing with Olympic issues, including looking up the flight schedules for the different airlines that are able to provide the approved flights into Beijing for Olympic staff, volunteers and media members. I heard back from a woman at Air France, who told me that she would be in touch with her team, which would in turn be in touch with me once they figured out a possible flight situation. And sure enough, when I woke up this morning, there was an e-mail from one of those team members, offering a couple of different flight options on the days that I nee...

The calendar turned to 2022 over the weekend, which means it is officially a Winter Olympic year. And if everything goes as planned, one month from now, I should be in Beijing for my fourth Olympic experience. But, as I've documented here over the last few months, nothing is going as planned. If you asked me today, I would say that the chances that I actually make it to China and see an Olympic event are probably about 15-20 percent. So, I am not terribly optimistic about everything working out like it should and it's so incredibly frustrating. As I've written here in the past, I had booked a flight from Boston to Beijing through Hong Kong on Cathay Pacific, set to arrive on Feb. 3, the day before the Winter Olympics opening ceremonies. However, because Beijing 2022 wants us to fly into Beijing on special "temporary" flights, I contacted Cathay Pacific about getting booked on one of those from Hong Kong. The representative told me that the Boston to Hong Kong flig...