It’s Wednesday, almost 8 am Zagreb time (11 pm Tuesday Seattle time). I got about 6 hours of sleep (in 2 batches) and am still very tired and my neck extra sore from lugging my heavy carry-on bag around 3 airports yesterday. I wish I had access to the pain relief gel that is in my suitcase. Clean clothes would also be nice. But alas, none of our three suitcases arrived with us in Zagreb yesterday.
We made it to Amsterdam about 10 minutes late, then sat on the plane for another 10 minutes waiting for someone to bring the jetway to the plane. It took at least 10 more minutes to hike from the G gates to the line to go through border control. Before reaching the line we thought we had a decent chance of catching our connecting flight to Zagreb. Those hopes were dashed when we got to the end of the line which stretched far out of the border control area through the central shopping area. We’d never seen a line here anywhere close to the length of this one. I asked a worker if there was an expedited line for people with short connecting times. He said I could go to the front of the line and ask but he thought it unlikely they would allow us to move forward. Jim held our spot while I went to ask. The young man I talked with looked at my boarding pass and said ok. I said I needed to get my husband and he said ok. So I walked back to find Jim and wave him forward. By the time we got to the front of the line a different young man was there. I told him the other guy said we could move to the front of the line. This guy looked at our boarding pass and said no, we must go back to the end of the line. I asked if we could ask again later and he said sure, we could try. By the time we got back to the end of the line it was considerably longer. We were annoyed and discouraged by the fact that the workers were using different criteria for letting people into the shorter line. We stood in the line for a half hour and asked again, at which point the person I talked with said ok, so we got into a much shorter line with hope we might actually make our flight (still a 10 minute walk away). In our favor was the fact that the Border Control had temporarily suspended the requirement that non EU travelers must scan our eyeballs and fingerprints into the new EU monitoring system. We got through that line within 10 minutes and made it to our gate just before boarding began. We were of course relieved and grateful. A little bus drove us to our KLM city-hopper plane parked about 10 minutes away.
We arrived in Zagreb on time and made our way to the spacious baggage area with soaring ceilings and only one plane-load of travelers. We stood watching for our bags and when the carousel stopped moving we had the sinking feeling that our bags might not have made it. A man approached us and the other lingerers and announced that 30 bags ‘had stayed’ in Amsterdam (as if the suitcases decided to stay there) and we could file a report online or at the desk on the other side of the room. The man at the desk took our info and said the bags would hopefully be put on the 11 pm flight and someone would be in touch, but he couldn’t guarantee what day we might get our luggage. As of noon today we have heard nothing more. Nobody answers the phone at the number we were given. We were told they will contact us when the bags arrive… we wish we could talk with a human now to get an update.
We then went to the Nova car rental desk to pick up the car we had reserved. We chose this company because they were the cheapest one this year and seemed to have a decent reputation. The young man told us they’d given us an upgrade to an automatic SUV because they didn’t have a smaller car. We said we preferred a manual and did not want a large car. He said this wasn’t big like American SUVs (and indeed it isn’t). He did find a manual SUV and changed us to that even though we had said the automatic was fine (I actually liked that idea in case I have to drive). By the time we added road side assistance to our maxed out agreement the price wasn’t much less than the other companies, and this morning it occurred to me that the road side assistance (that we paid 200 euros for) might only cover Croatia (where we don’t plan on spending a lot of time). It didn’t occur to me to ask yesterday when in my sleep deprived state. When Jim drove us to our apartment his first impression is it is a good car. Let’s hope it keeps us safe.
…
Suzana, owner of Apatman Battistutti, greeted us warmly and reminded us of where things are in this very clean efficient 2 bedroom apartment on the top floor of her house where we stayed on arrival and departure last year. It’s the priciest place we’ve stayed on any of our trips, now almost $100 night, still cheap by American standards but considerably more than what we pay anywhere else. But it has a parking spot (rare in the city), a balcony, and is convenient for walking to markets, shops, Old Town, and Maksimir Park. She offered us toothpaste and soap when we told her about our missing luggage. We forgot to ask if she had floss.
We walked 10 minutes to Bigy’s pizza restaurant where we’ve eaten many times, and the same waitress served us who has served us many times. She remembered us, at least by sight if not our details. I got chicken risotto and Jim got a turkey filet. We shared ‘season salad’ and bubble water. Our meal cost about $35.
We showered. I washed my underwear and shirt in the sink (luckily I had 1 spare pair in my carry on). We were grateful for Suzana’s toothpaste but greatly missed floss! My skin was dried out from the plane rides and I had no lotion in my carryon but found olive oil in the cupboard so used that. My very sore neck was sad to not have the 2 down pillows that are in my luggage. And today, even though my shirt is clean my pants stink. It’s supposed to be 90 and Jim and I both are stuck with long dark pants. We hope to hear something definitive about our luggage today so we can decide what we most need to buy if our luggage isn’t expected to arrive.
Despite our delayed luggage issue I am grateful we made our connecting flight and have arrived here safely.
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