Friday, July 22, 2011

Kastrup - Accommodating Airport for the Flexible. Copenhagen

Copenhagen: Kastrup Airport
Kastrup to a frequent traveler may look at first like just another airport. It has its twitches however.
 
1. Accommodations are not nearby.  If the several reasonable rooms at the Hilton are occupied, you will have to get on mass transit to another route a stop or two away, then walk to try to find a room.  There is no central bank of phones or shuttles to take you. The railway is just below ground, as are taxis.  The drill is: hop on a train and go 10 minutes back into Copenhagen somewhere, and start walking? Not handy. And how to get a taxi back at 4AM in time for a 6AM flight out?

Go back to the car rental, but the car is already processed through. Can't even get that back.

2.  Boarding pass. If your boarding pass is printed on hotel paper with the logo on the reverse, it may not go through.  At the airport, Dan's boarding pass went through, but mine, and we had printed out on the same printer at the hotel, but mine balked. Sorry, lady, just step aside here for another pat down, and another.

3. We ended up sleeping in Kastrup.


Our last good night's sleep:
  • Here's the hotel: wouldn't anyone trust it.

Trees in the hallways.


 But the printer ran out of paper. Run out to the lobby, run back with a stack, stuff it, and print and run.

Sleeping in the airport isn't so bad.  Food available.

Plan B.  No big deal. We always told each other on the Car-Dan Tour Company that if we couldn't find a place to sleep, we would go to the local police station, introduce ourselves, and curl up in their parking lot.

Next best thing is the airport lobby.  Doze until midnight when the doors open to get into the specific airway lounges (you can only go in on the day you are scheduled to leave).  Plan: Get through the inspections at midnight and find a nicer lounge area until 5AM boarding, perhaps even a place without arm rests.

 Clearance is challenging.



There.  It only takes three seats, and a bend at the top.  ZZZZzzzz.



 
You will not be alone. Many people sleep in the airport. Hotels are costly so why even bother with that?  We seldom get a good sleep the night before anyway - too much rifling around in the backpacks and throwing out stuff so you can get on without checking anything through. 


The thrill wore off.

If the boarding pass had gone through at midnight when we first went upstairs (noone is allowed into the boarding areas until the day of the flight), we at least could have slept on more comfortable lounge chairs up there.

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