After our near-miss on our first flight of the trip, we were determined not to let something like that happen ever again. We checked our flight info the night before and set our alarms accordingly. Well...unfortunately, we hadn't set our clocks to the German time zone from Brussels, so we woke up an hour later than planned.
No big deal, we still had allotted ourselves plenty of time. We got to the airport via the train station in about 10 minutes, and we felt good. We still had an hour and a half until our flight left. As Ellie was talking to information, Sonja and I scouted out the ticketing agents looking for RyanAir. We couldn't find it. We headed back over to Ellie, who looked devastated. We asked what was wrong. She said, "We're at the wrong airport."
No.
Please.
Not again.
We looked at our tickets. They said Frankfurt Hahn. This was Frankfurt International. We were pissed.
The lady at the info desk told us we could wait for the bus shuttle to take us, but we didn't want to take any chances this time. We were willing to pay the extra money for a taxi if it meant it would get us there in time.
So we flagged down a taxi and asked the driver how much it would cost to get to Hahn. He shook his head and pointed at the meter. We were like, fine. Whatever. We'll pay whatever it is to get across the city.
About five minutes into the ride, Ellie asked him how long it would take to get to Hahn. He said, "Eh...hour and a half, hour forty five."
Uh...
We were so startled that we just sat there for a moment. Finally we were like, ok, nevermind, take us back to the airport because a) we're gonna miss our flight anyway and b)there's no way we could afford a two hour taxi fare. At this point, the driver turned into a first class you-know-what and started yelling at us for making him lose his spot in line. Then he told us we were stupid for not knowing what airport we were going to. Then he tried to make a deal, 150 euros flat rate to get to Hahn. We were like, look buddy. Take us back to the airport now. He said it was too late, he was already headed for the train station. And besides, we couldn't get to Hahn from the airport (this was obviously a lie, since we knew about the shuttle bus). Needless to say, we got screwed by the taxi driver who drove around for another 15 minutes to get his money's worth. 35 euros later we were back where we started.
Another 12 euros later, we were on the shuttle bus to Hahn.
About a half hour into the ride I fell asleep, (Ellie took pictures, really cute, Ellie) but when I woke up I looked around and we were in the middle of nowhere. We're talking no human life as far as the eye can see. I saw fields, forests, mountains, lakes, sheep, cattle, basically every kind of wild terrain Germany has to offer. I looked over at Ellie and we both burst out laughing. We got screwed by RyanAir. Hahn was nowhere near Frankfurt.
When we got there, two hours later, we paid our lovely rebooking fee, rebooked for the next day, and lamented about all the money and experiences were missing out on. We weren't going to see Oslo, we still had to pay for our overnight in Oslo that we had booked long ago, as well as a rebooking fee, and the cost for a room wherever we could find one in this godforsaken town.
We seriously doubted we would find a hotel at all, but Ellie (who speaks German, go Ellie!) talked to a man at the info desk who set us up with a good hotel package: a room for three for 40 euros total, free breakfast and internet, and a shuttle to and from the airport.
We got on the shuttle, headed to the little town the hotel was in, and checked in. We then went out to discover what the town had to offer. This is what we found:
A convenience store.
A bar.
Lots of farm equipment.
We were in the boonies! It kind of made me miss Iowa to tell you the truth. It was so great though. We went to the C-store and bought a bottle of wine each, cheese and crackers, and chocolate. We were determined to make the best of an increasingly horrible situation.
So that night we literally drowned our sorrows and engaged in silly roommate antics, such as dressing in all black and sneaking downstairs to do some drunk facebooking at 3am (its a college thing).
All in all, the best night possible after the events that had unfolded.
Kind of have a soft spot in my heart for Hahn, come to think of it.
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