From Goa to New York
12 to 15 February 2008
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On 12 February we took our last walk from Colva to Benaulim, had lunch in Benaulim,
and took the public bus back to Colva.
About 6:00 pm we took a motorickshaw taxi from Colva to the Margao railway station.
The train, No. 0112 Konkan Kanya Express for which we had bought tickets a couple of
days earlier, departed about 7:30 pm. Because the train had been very heavily booked
when we bought our tickets we could get only "Tatkal Sewa' tickets not subject to our
usual 30% senior discount, and subject to a surcharge; the total cost for the two of us
came to Rs. 2822 (US$76), the most we ever paid for a train trip in India. We had a
comfortable night on the Class 2AC sleeper and arrived at Mumbai's CSTM terminal
(formerly Victoria Terminus) the following morning about 8:00 am.
Upon our morning arrival in Mumbai we checked into the Welcome Hotel,
welcome_hotel@vsnl.com , at 257 Shahid Bhagat Singh Road (a.k.a. Colaba Causeway),
very near the railway terminal. That was the only hotel on this Central India Trip
where we could take hot-water showers. From our window on the fifth floor we had a
beautiful view the CSSTM Terminal.
In the afternoon we visited the large CSMVS (formerly Prince of Wales Museum). In
the evening we had dinner in the luxurious (and expensive) Sher-E-Punjab Restaurant
located in the same building as our hotel.
The following day, 14 February we took a taxi to Mumbai's international airport for
our Virgin Atlantic flight 351 scheduled to depart Mumbai at 2:10 pm and to arrive at
London's Heathrow Airport 1:30 hours before our connecting flight to New York.
Unfortunately, upon our arrival in London we were told that our flight from Mumbai
arrived in London too late for us to transfer to our scheduled connecting flight to New
York, and that we would have to stay in London overnight at our own expense before
continuing to New York the following day. That came as a shock to us and to the dozen
or so other passengers in our situation. In similar situations other airlines had always
issued us vouchers for the overnight hotel and breakfast, but Virgin Atlantic refused to
do so despite pleas and bitter complaints by us and the dozen or so other passengers
forced by Virgin Atlantic to stay in London overnight at their own expense.
We stayed at a Heathrow Airport hotel overnight at our own expense and later in the
day were able to continue our trip to New York without additional problems.
A day or two after our return home I emailed Virgin Atlantic's customer relations
department complaining about our treatment in London and requesting reimbursement of
our out-of-pocket hotel and breakfast expenses at Heathrow Airport. On 26 March
Virgin Atlantic emailed us that a US$220 reimbursement check would be sent us
"shortly". We received the check about a month later.