The Dream
18 June 2022
While I sat on the flight to Amsterdam, I couldn’t
believe that we had actually made it. The dream trip, the trip that we had
wanted to realize way back in 2020 (but we all know what happened in 2020) is
finally turning to life. 2022, the year of resumption of travels or revenge tourism
as they call it, rekindled our dream of our much-awaited Europe trip. All those
days of discussing the Europe trip flashed in front of my eyes.
While I was unaware what behold us, it was sure that this was going to be one hell of a journey.
And it was too, all
thanks to our 'meticulous planning', or as I would like to call it, 'How Not
to plan a Euro trip!'
How to Plan, How not to
May 2022
It was a weekend in Bangalore, and the general
rule is that if we did not step out of the home for roaming around, then we
would end up planning a trip! And that is exactly what happened. The scapegoats
this time were Soorej and Praveena as they too were with us at that moment. One
discussion led to another, and we finally decided that it is time to reinstate
the Euro trip.
The gang: Me, Simi, Nachu, Soorej and
Praveena.
Praveena was okay for the trip. Soorej denied
saying 2 weeks of leave is too much and so he will not be able to join the trip.
We did not bother much, as we knew he would come around.
The other challenge was with Nachu. Nachu
would join school for the first time, for nursery, on 6th of June 2022. We
couldn't plan to complete the trip before that, as that wouldn't leave us
enough time for planning and the visa application process. Travelling after
June 6 would mean that she must be absent from school immediately after joining
school. Hmm...Tough choice...
After thinking long for 10 seconds, we knew
what to do. Anyhow it's not like she's been absent from school before. There is
always a first time to be absent. Her's will be immediately after joining. So
that's it. Dates finalized. Euro Trip - 18 June to 3 July.
See, how easy it is to plan a Euro trip. Oh!
Well, forgot something. Where all in Europe do we go?
My cousin Sudhi was in Switzerland, so
Switzerland became an automatic choice (free stay + We don't know if he
remembers, when he moved to Switzerland, he had invited us. We do
remember 😌). Amsterdam also made the cut owing to the availability of a
specially baked cake. Austria was another place in contention, but someone told
us that Swiss and Austria has similar landscapes and to try Italy instead.
Okay, Italy it is! .'So, let's go to Amsterdam, and we will return from some
place in Italy.', we decided. We looked for flights and found that the rates to
Bangalore were cheaper from Rome. So, that's sorted. We didn't book the tickets
yet, but finalized this plan.
18 June: Bangalore to Amsterdam
3 July: Rome to Bangalore
Now, we had to start off with the visa
application. There are several documents required for the visa application and
we all started it one-by-one. The visa application also required the day wise
itinerary and opening google maps to plan the itinerary revealed a staggering
stat.
Amsterdam and Rome are 1611 kilometres apart!
How are we supposed to land in Amsterdam and
then reach Rome, so that we can return from Rome which is so far away? That too
in 2 weeks? We did not have the answer yet, but the positive thing was that
once we have the answer, that becomes the itinerary!
Our initial plan was to rent a car and
self-drive the whole duration of the trip. Yay, Road Trip! But then 2 weeks may
not be enough for a complete road trip. We called up Sudhi and delighted (or
startled) him that we will be visiting Switzerland for a few days. We took
suggestions from him and continued with our investigation to finally reach a
conclusion. Itinerary ready in no time!
Amsterdam to Zurich via flight. Car rental for
Switzerland local sightseeing. Return the car, take a new car from Zurich (2
cars decided based on cost factors) and drive to Rome and drop the car in Rome.
Fly back.
 |
| The easy peazy itinerary |
Now that the route map was ready, we had to
book flights and accommodation as that is required for the visa. Some travel
agents do provide dummy bookings. But since most of the hotels have free
cancellation up to a week before check-in, we opted to go ahead and book the accommodations
right away and use actual bookings for the visa. We booked the flight too and
gathered all other documents. By the way, Soorej had come around and was
actively participating all document gathering and planning 😀. He in fact even
arranged a travel agent to help us with the visa, whose 'help' turned out to be
a nightmare in itself. We shared all the documents to the travel agent, whose
only job was to book us a visa appointment. It is when we attempted for visa
appointment that we came to know about the rush for visa application. We were
not even able to get a slot for appointment. The visa appointment application
portal did not have enough slots, and even for the slots that were shown as
available, the payment was not going through. At times, the only slots were
shown for July! We kept trying and the travel agent finally succeeded in
booking separate slots, one for Soorej, Praveena and another for us. Kudos,
until we saw the appointment confirmation. He had misspelt the passport number
of Praveena. Time was running out; he had to cancel that appointment and try
all over again. He again managed to get an appointment, this time an earlier
date, but different location, Chennai! Which means Soorej and Praveena get to
go on a Chennai trip to go for a Euro trip! The Visa appointment dates were
finally confirmed.
Me, Simi and Nachu - 2nd June in Bangalore
Soorej and Praveena - 31st May in Chennai
All the tension that built up when we weren't
able to get appointment, made way for joy when we finally managed to get the
appointment dates. We knew from past experience of travellers that visas take
around a week. We had 11 working days to get the visa from the date of
appointment. So, we could say that we just made it. Whew! Just to be sure, we
googled what are the visa processing times in the recent past.
Thanks to revenge tourism, there was a high
demand for visa, lack of staff and extremely high delays in visa processing.
Once search and thanks to google, our feeds kept on showing news articles of
various accounts of people having had to cancel trips as they did not get visa
on time. Some European countries even couldn't process visas after 45 days.
More than 45 days? Well, we had 11!
The visa application process was smooth. While
handing over the passport and visa application, we asked the consulate what the
estimated time for visa arrival was. Everyone in the consulate were well
taught, they never committed any date. Fingers crossed, we counted days and
google sadistically kept showing up posts of delayed visas on our feeds. As
days went along, it also meant that if we were to get the visa, the travel date
is nearing. That definitely calls for some travel shopping. The Myntra delivery
guy visited our apartment almost a daily basis. He could rent a house in our
apartment complex, and he would be working from home! Weather appropriate
apparels that arrived in our apartments too were in a dilemma, whether they
will visit Europe or will have to go back to the Myntra warehouse.
The visa status could be tracked online, and
we eagerly checked the status every minute of the day. Though the days were
running fast, the status update of the visa application was in snail's pace. June 3,4, 5, 6, 7, 8,9,10,11,12,13.. Tension mounted. Several cancellation charges
stared at our faces!
Finally, on the 14th of June, Soorej and
Praveena received their passports with visa stamped and we got ours on 15th! Whew!
That was close, just 3 days before the travel date. (Yeah, we could have
applied 2 days late and still made it 😜). We were happy, more than happy,
relieved. And then happy again.
Yes, The Euro trip is ON!
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