SOUTH AFRICA: Good Grief….aka, All The Fun You Can Have Traveling In One Trip!

[gearguywb]

I had intended for this to be a report on my first trip back to Africa in 20 years, and my wife’s first trip ever.

So far it has been…shall we say…a bit of a challenge.

The back story;
We live in KC and have planned on a trip to hunt with @MPETI SAFARIS OUTFITTER for close to a year. Buffalo, zebra, warthog and Nyala hopefully on the menu!

Reservations made approx 6 months ago through Gracy. Used points for 1 of our flights (through Gracy). Upgrade both to comfort plus.

We leave home headed to MCI with plenty of time. 3 bags to check, one with a 416 and a R8 (with suppressor). All paperwork, etc.

Arrive in Atlanta about 45 minutes late but we had plenty of time to catch the late non-stop to J’burg.

Now the fun begins….

 

[gearguywb]

Flight delayed for 2 hours to allow “cleaning”. Of course the plane has been there since noon. Go figure.

We board the flight…then nothing. Delayed 20 minutes. Delayed another 20 minutes. Delayed 30 minutes. Delayed another 30 minutes. No reasons given.

Then the dreaded “pilots dont have enough time left to fly”.

Get off plane. Call Gracy. “We will look at options and call you right back”. Stand in line for 45 minutes to talk to the Delta rep. They try to push me through Amsterdam or Newark. Neither will work with guns/suppressors.

No word from Gracy.

No other flights available.

Go downstairs to get bags (it is now 2AM). Baggage handlers are gone for the night. Call Gracy. Working on it and we will call you back in a few minutes with options.

Wait…wait…wait.Call Gracy again. Nothing available Friday, Saturday or Sunday.

Stay in ATL until 9AM hoping to at least get our suitcases with clothes. Nothing doing. Delta supervisor “you will get your bags but it may be late this afternoon”. I show him where the bags are with air tags. Too bad.

We are now 14 hours into hanging out in ATL.

Nothing from Gracy. At 6 AM we find a supervisor with Delta that books us on the Monday flight, arriving in J’burg Tuesday night and they bump us to 1st class.

Finally leave, without bags, to find a hotel. Of course there are two big concerts and a baseball game in ATL so we Uber 45 minutes to find a hotel with a vacancy.

The entire time I am tracking our bags, which haven’t moved from terminal B.

2PM this afternoon I receive a text from Gracy “it looks like you have re-booked on Monday night”. Yep.

Go to the airport at 4PM to pick up our two suitcases so we can shower, change clothes, etc. Gun case still hasn’t moved.

Throughout this fiasco MPETI has been in contact with us saying they will do whatever they can to get our hunt in. Very pleasant and responsive so far.

No instead of 7+ days, we may be able to get in 5…..we’ll see how it goes.

I hope the next installment is filled with much better news!

Lessons learned:
Once anything goes off the rails, having your own firearms to travel with has caused even more problems due to limited options on flights.

Some Delta employees have been great, the vast majority, not so much

Spondivits still has wonderful seafood!

More to come

 

[Sideshow]

Well at least you have your chin up!
Hang tough hope it works out for you guys!

 

[JimP]

Air travel is so much fun.

Even when everything goes right you are still miserable. At least they upgraded you.

 

[JCharp391]

Brother, I was on that flight with you. It totally ruined our entire experience. This was supposed to be our first time hunting in Africa and I'm fairly certain we will never go now. We ended up flying back home. None of our luggage flew with us despite their (Delta's) repeated insistence that our bows and luggage would be with us. Our suit case was terribly damaged. I still don't have my bow. My buddy's bow had no tracking on it and they told him that they did not know where it was. It should all be in tonight but Delta f**ked us hard on this and honestly I have no want/drive to try and hunt Africa at this point. I do understand that this may be an isolated incident but we worked hard for the last year to save up for this trip and everything fell through at the last leg because of Delta's piss poor planning. The last 24 hours has been all of the absolute worst things that could've happened to us.

 

[LivingTheDream]

Really sorry to hear this guys! Hopefully the situation improves, @JCharp391 don't give up the dream yet, it will be worth it!

 

[MontanaPat]

Sorry to hear about the snafus you’ve both endured. While I’m a 3Million+ lifetime flyer on Delta at this point I don’t think I trust them to go back to Africa. I flew Qatar the last trip in 2024 and will stick with them or anyone besides Delta and United

 

[Newboomer]

Sorry to hear about the snafus you’ve both endured. While I’m a 3Million+ lifetime flyer on Delta at this point I don’t think I trust them to go back to Africa. I flew Qatar the last trip in 2024 and will stick with them or anyone besides Delta and United

Yup. Welcome to Delta World. Total FUBAR. Been there, done that.

 

[375Fox]

Sorry for your luck. That’s normally a very reliable flight. Not sure how much you travel, but since 2021 I run about 2 for 3 domestic flights go mostly to plan. The third is always a headache. My worst experience has actually been returning to US on a Qatar ticket. It’s a roll of the dice unfortunately.

 

[Tally-Ho HUNTING SAFARIS]

I also had a client recently missed connection in atlanta then delta coukd only get him on 2.5 days later
Dont fly delta guys they cancel their flights willy nilly
There are better ways to get to africa i know direct is best and i agree on that but delta is dropping the ball very iften these days

 

[Philip Glass]

I am sorry to hear these terrible stories. It seems they never disclosed the reason for the delay. That doesn't help matters. Airlines do a terrible job of reuniting people with their luggage after a cancelled flight. There is no excuse for this. It should all go straight to the carousel!
We've been hearing more trouble with Delta lately but still not as bad as United.
I really hate to hear these experiences put people off from ever traveling internationally.

 

[Bandera]

Hate to hear about the flight problems.
Unfortunately it is not just Delta, it is American, United, all of them.

 

[JCharp391]

@gearguywb were you guys ever able to get your rifle?

 

[godwincp]

My last trip on delta we loaded the plane in Atlanta and then waited for over an hour to get the galley serviced! Like they had 12+ hours to get it done. Thankfully we left after that and made up quite a bit of time. Sorry to hear about your experience- you’ll be in Africa soon and I’m sure it will all work out. Good hunting

 

[Doug3006]

I’m only aware of two direct flights to JNB from the US. Delta and United. Both seem to have spotty records and a history of bad customer service. That leaves us with connections via Europe, Africa (Ethiopian Air) or the Middle East. I think a connection is preferable even though it takes a bit longer to get to JNB.

I had a great experience in April flying Lufthansa from my home in St. Louis to Frankfurt and then to Windhoek, Namibia. I’ve also flown on Emirates via Dubai and Qatar via Doha. Both went well.

To be fair, I had no trouble on my one trip each on Delta and United to Africa. However, I’ve heard enough horror stories that I avoid them when I can.

 

[JCharp391]

Really sorry to hear this guys! Hopefully the situation improves, @JCharp391 don't give up the dream yet, it will be worth it!

I'm a little more levelheaded today but the way Delta handled that whole situation especially with the luggage just made everything terrible. My wife and I may look at rebooking in the next few years.

 

[gearguywb]

I am late updating this, my apologies.

We finally went out Monday night, landing in J'oburg Tuesday evening.

Thankfully the PH went above and beyond....waiting in town for us, then helping with the customs issues.

Unfortunately no one from the travel agency was there to greet us and help with the logistics. We were the last 2 united with our luggage and firearms.

One more day of our trip to come, then we will see how it goes traveling the other direction.

It has been a fantastic hunt, great scenery, wonderful animal populations, food to die for!

I will post in the trip reports in the coming week.

 

[Nyati]

My last trip was such a mess, I decided I had enough with airports.

 

[Hunt anything]

I had a friend, his wife and granddaughter on that flight. They were rerouted through Paris and lost 3 days I think. Their return back to Atlanta wasn’t much better.
My wife, daughter and I are on that flight in August, haven’t had any trouble before but this definitely not giving me a warm fuzzy feeling.

 

[Doug3006]

My last trip was such a mess, I decided I had enough with airports.

Steamship the next time?