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I recently found myself buying a pair of tickets from Kona to Kapalua. AA.com (who I find have the easiest-to-use all-airlines schedule) found me a nonstop with an Aloha Air flightcode for $121 each, plus $5.70 in taxes. AlohaAir.com had the same total price, but claimed that $14.14 of it was tax. Expedia and Travelocity (the latter of whom win the prize for slowest web search) agreed with Aloha about how much was tax, and added a $5 per ticket "booking fee". So far, so straightforward, so much for the online travel agents. But what AA.com didn't reveal is that the flight isn't operated by Aloha, it's operated by Island Air. Buying an Island Air-designated ticket on the same flight on Travelocity lowered the total price to $94.93 each. On Expedia, it was $85.00. And on IslandAir.com, it was $64.27! And the frequent flyer miles are United miles either way.

My world map is pretty miscellaneous, with only seven countries spread fairly evenly among four continents. But ( this ) looks much more intentional.

So ( this story ) has not one but three traveling lessons:

• Never take the last flight of the day
  
• Never run for a plane
  
• Never assume a train is running on time
  

A friend of mine has recently returned from a trip to West Africa, after a delayed Royal Air Maroc flight. I've had some adventures with Royal Air Maroc myself, and though I haven't yet heard his story I am inspired to tell mine.

I was flying from Boston to Morocco to visit a friend. Lufthansa flies to Casablanca and Tangiers with one change of plane, in Frankfurt. Iberia flies to several destinations in Morocco with a change in Madrid. The only nonstop from the US to Morocco is on Royal Air Maroc, which flies from New York to Casablanca and will ticket from Boston, Montreal, or Washington DC via a code-share with American. I decided that if I was going to get stuck someplace I wanted it to be someplace I could speak the language, and booked my flights accordingly.

Everything went smoothly on the way there and almost all the way back. Casablanca's airport is capable of dealing with much more traffic than was present at the time (nearly a decade ago) and the R.A.M. 747, though aged, had no problems in either direction. The return flight was during Ramadan and I was amused that the long-journey fasting exception applied to alcohol served on the flight as well. I was worried about my 90-minute connection to a different terminal in JFK, but cleared customs in New York in plenty of time to make it onto the last leg, an American Eagle ATR-42. An hour or so into the flight -- just past Hartford -- the airplane lost a generator on one of the two engines. No problem; there are two generators on board. But once a generator has gone, it has to be fixed before the next time the airplane can take off. And American doesn't have ATR maintenance facilities in Boston, only New York. They could have paid someone else to fix the plane in Boston. But it was cheaper to turn around, fly back to New York, and put the bunch of us on a shuttle flight. So back to New York we went. Of course the shuttles fly out of Laguardia, not Kennedy, so we got to endure a chartered bus ride through Queens as well.

Needless to say, I now avoid turboprops (along with checked baggage, running to make connections, and taking the last flight of the day, all of which have stories associated with them) whenever I can. The next time I flew across the Atlantic from Kennedy, I made my connecting flights on TWA, which flies regional jets. And as a bonus, I got to enjoy Eero Saarinen's wonderful architecture along the way.

or, the real reason I took the day after Two Towers off work

Got up after 6 hours of sleep, quickly showered and rendezvoused with extended family members, and got in the car to drive out to my grandfather's place for his 80th birthday. Tried a new route which Mapquest had suggested a while ago; it turned out to take just about exactly the same amount of time, but was considerably more scenic, so that's a win. Dinner in Vermont, then more socializing with my youngest cousin on that side, and his wife and two charming little daughters. So odd to hear him constantly being called "Daddy" -- not only is he still a little kid himself in my mind, but also none of the rest of our generation has had kids yet. Grandpa was thrilled to see us; we also regaled him with gifts -- in my case, one which I'd bought him four years ago and then forgotten about, so in a way nice that it had wound up being a gift for a more significant birthday -- but after 80 years he has everything he needs and even if that weren't true I think he'd have been just as happy without any presents.

Home now (via the old route, as it has gas stations), and ready for bed. I'd wonder how long it'll take me to get back on a normal schedule, but really I should just admit that this is a normal schedule for me and have done with it.