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The Travel Tip You’re Always Told, but Rarely Follow

By on September 9, 2014

We have a special red tag on our large, green bag. This piece of luggage almost always contains our snorkeling and SCUBA gear.

We were on vacation, and on our way to tropical islands. My wife, Megan, and I were about to start our sailing adventure with some classes to get the wind in our sails! Do you think that when I saw our (or was it?) large, green bag on the conveyor belt that I stopped to check and see if the special red tag was there?

My wife was ordering rum drinks at the airport bar to quench our thirst. I saw the large green bag, grabbed it off of the conveyor, and on we went. We were happy as clams!

We took a cab to the Charlotte Amalie ferry dock. We bought tickets for the ferry to Road Town, Tortola, British Virgin Islands and we checked our larger bags onto the ferry.

The ferry ride was fairly uneventful. We did meet some cruisers from the Lake Lanier Sailing Club that were chartering some sailboats for the week.

We arrived in Tortola and had to go through customs. Unknowingly, we went through customs with somebody else’s big green bag. No problem!

We picked up a cab to our hotel. We checked in. We went to our hotel room. We weren’t going SCUBA diving immediately, and the next day we were waking up and starting our Basic Keelboat sailing class with Rob Swain Sailing School. There was absolutely no need to open and look in that big green bag! It did have a lot of our sunscreen in it and we were heading to the beach at Nanny Cay Marina, but it was already 5pm. No sunscreen needed, and still no need to open that big green bag.

It ends up that not knowing that we had somebody else’s big green bag was for the best, but we’ll get to that in a minute…

We went to the beach, and looked around the marina. We constantly had a rum drink in our hands and we enjoyed the barbecue on the beach for dinner! We were on vacation! There was no need to check email, or turn on my phone in a foreign country just to get outlandish roaming charges. Everything was glorious!

The next morning Megan and I woke up at about 7:30am. She is an early riser, but I can usually sleep until 10am. I’m the night owl, but I was excited to start learning to sail!

I decide to go ahead and open up the trusty Macbook Pro, get onto the hotel’s wifi, and check a few emails to make sure that we had everything we needed for sailing class.

The subject line from one of the emails went something like, “We have one of your bags.” I thought to myself, “Well, that’s interesting because I look around the room and see all of our bags right here. What is this person talking about?” The email was also from somebody named Joshua that I did not know.

I had to think for a few more minutes. After all, I hadn’t had my coffee yet.  Then it dawned on me, “You know, we haven’t opened that big green bag yet.”

I went over to inspect the bag a little closer and as I looked at the outside I realized that there was no special red tag on this big green bag. I opened the bag to find…wait for it…a lot of clothes! None of our SCUBA equipment was in this big green bag, and that’s some expensive SCUBA equipment!

Luckily, Joshua had included a few phone numbers in his email and I had included all of my contact information on the tag of our big green bag. He had left messages for me every way he could.

In one of those messages he also mentioned that he was in Tortola. It still hadn’t dawned on me that I picked up the wrong bag in St. Thomas – a whole different island. But his information also kept me from worrying about the fact that our SCUBA gear could have been on a whole different island.

My amazing wife had made us some coffee. I had a few sips, and started thinking a little bit clearer. I started contacting Joshua every way I knew how. I emailed him back, I texted, and I called his phone number. I was leaving messages everywhere. I had to go out onto our lanai to keep decent cell phone service, but I also called his travel agent.

Within a few minutes, and by this time it was 8:15am, Joshua was calling back. His family was renting a villa for the week and they had also rented a van to get all of his family around the island. He and his wife figured out that they were only about 15 to 20 minutes away from Nanny Cay and that they could head our way as soon as they put some clothes on.

Joshua and his wife arrived at Nanny Cay at 8:40am with our big green bag, and I brought their big green bag out to them. The first thing I spotted when they showed up was that special red tag that I had put on our bag to stop things like this from happening.

DUH!!! What’s that travel tip that you’re always told, but rarely follow? Inspect the bags that you checked on the airplane to make sure that when you pick them up at your destination they are actually yours! Check the baggage claim tickets. Check for that special red tag!

So things ended up working out fine. Perfectly in fact. We switched bags, and there was still 20 minutes left to drop our bag off in our hotel room and get to sailing school! I’m really glad I didn’t know that I had somebody else’s luggage. I’m really glad that Megan and I had a great first night of vacation not worrying about how to get our luggage back!

Joshua and his wife’s story wasn’t quite so rosy.

They originated from somewhere other than Atlanta. They had a layover in Atlanta to get their flight to St. Thomas. I believe the story goes that their flight to Atlanta was delayed. They arrived at the gate in Atlanta about 5 seconds after the doors to the airplane’s ramp were closed. The plane to St. Thomas was still at the gate.

They decided that they would get on the next flight. I believe they even asked what flight their bags would be on. Apparently, their bags had made it on the plane even though they didn’t.

It was late when Joshua, his wife, and the rest of their family ended up getting to St. Thomas and they had been traveling all day. Their baggage had already arrived and was neatly set off to the side in an area where bags have not yet been picked up. They grabbed their bags, including their big green bag (or so they thought), and got into the cab that was waiting to take them to their ferry.

They didn’t check their baggage claim tickets either. They went through customs in the British Virgin Islands at Road Town, picked up their rental van, and headed to their villa. No problem!

They were finally on vacation and could relax right? But they hadn’t eaten much all night so they all decided to head to the local restaurant and grab a small bite to eat. Joshua’s wife wanted to change out of her travel clothes and put on a sun dress.

Instead of a sun dress, she would’ve had to wear a Buoyancy Control Device (BCD) and a wetsuit because that was what was in the big green bag that she had! That is when the emails, phone calls, and text messages began.

Everything worked out well, but I feel for Joshua and his wife. They spent the night wondering what island they were going to have to find a boat ride to in order to get their clothes.

My wife and I were oblivious and had a great Friday night! In hind sight (20-20 right?) we’re just glad it all worked out well for everybody, and we learned a little lesson…always check your baggage claim tickets!

TeddyJ

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About Teddy

I am a 37 year old that just wants to find a way to make a remote income, gather some Sail Loot and cruise the world! I have been sailing for a couple of years now, but mostly on 10 day trips as vacationing crew. I just recently took sailing to the next level by completing my Basic Keelboat, Basic Cruising, and Bareboat Cruising Certifications! I am also Vice President of a Medical Consulting Company, have a Mechanical Engineering degree from Georgia Tech, and have taken several Coding, Computing, and Online Business courses. It's time to share what I have learned!