Charleston -> Ramstein , then Spangda...

Author Message   John R Garrison Senior Member Username: Majorg Post Number: 2603 Registered: 02-2006 Posted From: 208.81.157.86 Posted on Wednesday, May 12, 2010 - 06:54 pm:    Marita: Thank you for taking the time and effort to share your most detailed and interesting trip report. Happy travels, John   John D. Moderator Username: John_d Post Number: 4461 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 95.208.80.143 Posted on Wednesday, May 12, 2010 - 04:14 pm:    Welcome to the club!   Marita Marcano Member Username: Joluma Post Number: 29 Registered: 03-2010 Posted From: 74.170.108.155 Posted on Wednesday, May 12, 2010 - 04:11 pm:    First of all a big thank you to this forum for all the valuable info on Space-A flights that helped us prepare for our first Space-A adventure. We could not have done it without you! My husband and I (Cat VI) drove from Jacksonville, FL, to Charleston the evening of April 8 and arrived in Charleston 4 hours later at 1:30 am on Friday, April 9. First we signed in at the PAX terminal, then parked the car at the long-term parking two blocks away and slept in the car for about 2.5 hours. By 5:00 am we went back to the terminal to await the first roll call at 6:00 am. That morning there were 4 flights to Ramstein, Germany. The first flight had 5 tentative seats that materialized to 15 and only took Cat I to III, mostly families and dependents with kids. The second flight had 0 seats and the third flight had 15 tentative seats that materialized to 40 seats. There were about 20 PAX left in the terminal and this flight cleared the terminal and took all that were left, with 20 empty seats. By noon we were already in the air and on our way to Germany! It was a C17 with lots of cargo in the middle and little room to sleep. Thanks to this forum we were well prepared and had bought Therm-a-Rest sleeping mats and travel blankets. I found a small space near my seat and slept on the floor for about 2 hours. The two flight crew members in front of the plane who took care of us passengers were very nice and helpful and we all had a good flight. I brought a whole bag full of food: whole grain cheese sandwiches, apples, bananas and yoghurt and, of course, water. You cannot take any liquids through security but there are vending machines at the gates in Charleston where you can get bottled water for the plane. We flew 3 hours to Gander, New Foundland, Canada, where we had a 2 hour refuelling stop-over. Then it was another 6 hours to Ramstein, Germany, where we landed at 5:00 am local time. We talked to several other passengers on the plane who told us that they had been trying to go to Germany since Tuesday (it was Friday by then). The Tuesday flight had been in the air already and had to turn around because of technical problems and landed in McGuire instead of Charleston. Many people had to wait from Tuesday until Friday to get out to Germany. So we considered ourselves very fortunate to have picked the perfect day to catch a flight. I had been in touch with my brother in Germany via email (Blackberry) to let him know about our flight status (did we get on a flight or not?) and I called him on our arrival. When he told me he had an appointment at 8:00 am and was not able to pick us up at the train station in Trier before 11:00 am, we decided to try and rent a car at 8:00 am when the car rental places opened. So we walked over to the new beautiful hotel across the terminal in Ramstein and had a delicious German breakfast at the German bakery/café on the second floor with fresh German rolls with warm "Fleischkäse", Croissants and a good Latte Macchiato (Café Latte). At 8:00 am I called two Europcar locations but they all were out of cars, probably because of the start of spring break at DoDDS (?) schools. Shortly before 9:00 am we switched back to plan A to take a train to Trier and wait for my brother to pick us up. We took a taxi to the Landstuhl train station (about €10) and then hopped on a local train to Trier via Saarbrücken, where we arrived at 11:05 am. Ten minutes later my brother was there to pick us up and take us to my parents' house north of Bitburg. Since I came down with bronchitis the second day (which I probably had caught from someone here in the US we had over for dinner), we stayed with my parents for about 10 days and spent a lot of time with my family, who almost all live near my parents (I am a local German national). Because of my bronchitis my husband decided to take me to the clinic in Spangdahlem to see a doctor, a 25 minute drive. However, the clinic had no emergency room and I could not get an appointment the same day. Anyway, for anybody who should get sick while in the Spangdahlem area: You are insured with Tricare but they have to put you into the Tricare Overseas system before they can see you. That is what they told me. Also they said I could go and see a local doctor and then claim the expense with Tricare later. Since I could not get an appointment, I made an appointment the next day with my father's German primary care provider that I paid out of pocket (€21.44 for the visit) and that I could claim but will not do because of the small amount of money. April 20 When in Germany, we always get my mother's car to move around and do not have to rent a car. On April 20 we went to visit friends in Speyer and then continued to Stuttgart and Nagold, 40 minutes south west of Stuttgart at the northern edge of the Black Forest. We spent a week there with friends and tried to see all our friends in the Stuttgart area. We still have many friends there since I had lived there for many years and my husband was stationed there. That is where we met. Our friends in Nagold always take us to their favorite (Greek) restaurant: http://www.tavernemykonos.de. The food there is delicious! We also went out salsa dancing to Casa Linda in Nagold and to the Salsa Lounge in the Buddha Lounge Club Mandarin in Stuttgart. April 27 After a week in the Stuttgart area we drove back to my parents' house, spent another day with them and watched the Spangdahlem flight schedule. On the evening of April 28 we had my parents take us to Spangdahlem Air Base and we spent the night in the hotel on base because we wanted to be at the PAX terminal for the first roll call at 6:00 am and did not want my parents to get up so early. They were supposed to have 3 flights to Charleston on April 29. Since it was so early in the morning we took a taxi to the PAX terminal (instead of the base shuttle). Faber taxi service is on base (phone: (06565) 95 10 10). On base you only need to dial 95 10 10, no area code. The cost from the hotel to the PAX terminal is €10. April 29 The first roll call was postponed to 7:30 am and we got boarding passes for this flight that had 57 seats and only 4 takers including us. At 9:40 am the 4 of us were taken to the plane by pick-up truck but then were told that they had to take us back to the terminal because of maintenance of the plane. After 2 hours of waiting they cancelled the flight because they had to order a spare part for the engine. All other flights that day were cancelled, too. So we spent another night at the hotel on base, which is only $39, a real bargain! The new hotel building (# 520) is very nice, the rooms have all amenities, including a kitchenette with fridge and microwave. Wi-Fi is available in the hallways and in the lobby. The rooms in the old building (# 38) are smaller and older but have basically the same amenities and have Wi-Fi access in the guest rooms. Building # 38 is about 15 minutes walking distance from the new (main) hotel building # 520. There is a free base shuttle that passes all scheduled stops approximately every 30 minutes. There are a few restaurants and fast food places on base. Around the corner from hotel building 38 there is a Chinese restaurant and a café with Starbucks coffee and German pastries. April 30 The next day we took the shuttle back to the PAX terminal for the first roll call to Charleston at 12:00 pm. This plane had just arrived from downrange and had 19 seats available and 3 takers, including us. All other seats were taken by soldiers coming from downrange. We got boarding passes for this flight, also a C17, and took off at 15:00 local time, landed in Gander at about 3:30 pm EST (21:30 German time) and went on to Charleston after a refuelling stop-over of about 2 hours. We landed in Charleston shortly after 9:00 pm. By 2:00 am we were back home in Jacksonville. Weather: Our first week in Germany it was very cold but the last two weeks were sunny and spring arrived with a blast. Everything was blooming: magnolias, tulips etc. It was perfect spring travel weather. Immigration: - Ramstein: Since Ramstein is a big terminal, the immigration procedure is the same as in commercial airports. Before exiting the passenger area, a customs officer asked us to hand over any animal and/or dairy products and I handed over my last cheese sandwich . - Spangdahlem: This is a small passenger terminal and everything is very relaxed. The PAX representatives are very nice and helpful! Shortly before boarding the plane, a friendly German customs officer arrived at the terminal and checked passports. Since they had stamped my husband's passport with an entry stamp in Ramstein, they had to stamp him "out" at Spangdahlem. They had done that on our first day when our flight ended up getting cancelled, and a PAX representative called us in the afternoon to ask us to go back to the terminal so that my husband could get another "entry" stamp. The next day the same procedure: He got another "out" stamp. - Charleston: After landing in Charleston, a customs officer got on the plane to collect custom forms and to check IDs/passports. That was it! No questioning and no fingerprinting, as is the case for greencard holders like me when going through immigration at a US POE in commercial airports (fingerprinting is new since the beginning of 2009). We had an email sign-up date of March 13. Our sign-up email print-out was honored in Charleston and in Spangdahlem. Overall it was a very successful first Space-A trip for us. We had planned to be back home by May 2 and were back already in the early morning of May 1. My husband is retired and I am self-employed, so we are pretty flexible timewise. The volcano ash did not affect us and everything worked out almost perfectly. We will do it again!