the beauty of moving...ahhhh

Unbelievable but true, the shipment with all our things from Amsterdam has still not arrived. We packed everything mid June and took only summer clothes to Monaco. After all we were expecting to stay there till Sep/Oct, so we weren't in need of warm things. Obviously the containers are not at sea all this time. They were supposed to wait in Rotterdam harbour for our cue that we were leaving Monaco. When we finally knew the move date, we could not get in touch with any competent people from the freight company.
Once on the island we ultimately found out that, they currently don't have sufficient cargo to send a full ship from NL to SXM, and ours being only 17m3 couldn't be shipped alone. So our things will get shipped to Guadeloupe instead (hahah...) from where supposedly there are more frequent shipments to St. Martin. We heard this 3 weeks ago. I guess not that frequent after all.

Furthermore, while we were camping at the Charles de Gaulle airport, switching our flights, we had to make adjustments in terms of baggage and the different regulations of American carriers. There, instead of weight, units count. With our 13 pieces we were bound to pay 2 big fines (Paris-Miami and Miami-SXM), as our flight was with a 1 night stopover in Miami.
Therefore, thanks to a La Poste located conveniently at the airport, 9 of our suitcases we sent with regular post. This was 29.11; and our suitcases still have not arrived.
These 2 would not be a big issue; we don't need many garments down here for one, and living in a hotel room, the less suitcases you can trip over in the 16m2 the better. But we are going home for Christmas, were it is significantly colder. My personal favourite, is the temperature Warsaw will reach on the 12th of December:) a whole 45 degrees less than here.

the unexpected Paris holiday

As you imagine, we left Nice wearing summer clothes..after all we were supposed to land in SXM at hottest time of the day, 14.oo.
Paris was of course C O L D, but I must say sunny and beautiful. Autumn, my favourite season (which I was so worried I would not get to see this year) is a great time to visit this city. Thank you AF once more!
So Sunday morning, we open all of our 13 pieces of luggage in frantic search for winter gear...and hit the town!:)

More pics from Paris
Fili has not uploaded all yet...

Our trip interrupted by AF strike

We were scheduled to fly on the 26.10, but Fili had a meeting so we changed the flight to Saturday 27th. (btw, that meeting was cancelled at last moment).
We had a very early flight from Nice: there's only 1 flight Paris-SXM a day and it's at 10am:( We had 13 pieces of luggage! and an 80 or 90 kg limit (European airline, so limits per weight rather than units of luggage.)

We arrive at airport ON time:) it's the pre-All Saints w-end, so althought it's 4am...the airport is packed. We find out our total weight is 200kg! ohmi... Our boarding pass won't be given until we pay the fine. Can't pay it at checkin, must go to a long queue were angry French people are already screaming at the Airport employees. We know it's the days AF was supposed to strike...but the flight agency confirmed to us our Paris-SXM is operated, so we're tranquil. We were more concerned about the Nice-Paris, as this one was not confirmed.
We get 2 surprises: we are told excess weight is not being charged that day:)!, and we do get boarding passes to Paris. Yet the ladydog at the checkin won't give us passes to SXM. Says she can't access info whether Paris-SXM will fly and we must pick up our luggage in Paris, check there whether the flight goes, or not. We are advised to stay...but since she does not say for sure it's cancelled, we fly.
We arrive to a very angry Paris; even more tourists, more yelling, chaos. Our flight is of course: cancelled. After a few hours of useless queues and attempts at trying to figure out where to go, to get any info at all, we give up. We move our 2 overpacked trollies towards the hotel (thank God for hotels built indoors of airports). We're told they're full. We know they are not, Fili's dad phoned and was told there are rooms. So they have no choice but to give us one. We get a beautiful Paris view of the Charles de Gaulle runway....hahaha, it was actually fun to watch. We go discovering the 'neighbourhood' bistros. There are really plenty of places you can eat at without stepping a foot outside the airport. On the way back from lunch we pass another queue where we see many familiar faces.. There are babies crying, we here complaints of people who say they've been stuck there a few days. Yet now that we've been through our share of the ordeal, we get wise, calmly ask a lady if maybe there's a special business class queue. I feel bad for all the pregnant and nursing women behind our back as we make it to the counter in less than 3 minutes.
It is here that we discover what the strike is all about; cabin crew gets to decide whether they fly or not, and they announce it when they please. So this is why all flights remain scheduled, and become cancelled usually only at last minute. We are told we can not be booked on any flights within the following 6 days; there are long waiting lists on all. Moreover, there is no certainty they will actually take off. AF and KLM are the only direct flights to the island. Although we could try getting a train to Ams to fly from there, it's unthinkable with our amount of bags. We rebook to americanAirlines. It's not direct but it's relatively the earliest flight, without waiting lists, and without the risk of the cabin crew striking. Earliest means 4 days later. We get a paper to claim back from AF costs born due to our flight's cancellation.
We realise we'll have an unexpected Paris holiday (perhaps free of charge). We still don't know, paper sent, but no reply yet:)
We went back to the runway view hotel room....and slept till midnight. It did us good, started preparingfor the come in 4 days jet-lag.