Travel & Leisure

21 Rules of Stress-Free Travel

Once upon a time, air travel was a glamorous adventure. Now, it's more of a calamitous misadventure. Here's how to get from place to place without feeling like part of a cattle drive

So a whole group of weary travelers picked up their carry-ons and moved over to the new gate. And waited. An hour later, a second plane landed and taxied in. Passengers got off. It would only be a short time, we were told, before we boarded and headed to Hong Kong. We waited. And waited. And then, materializing out of a doorway, came the same shy and embarrassed airline employee.

"Very sorry," she said, "but this plane is more sick than the other plane...so...we will take the first plane!" And, like dutiful (and dumb) sheep, and without even questioning the agent as to how sick any of the carrier's planes were, we all marched quietly back to the first malfunctioning plane, boarded, and somehow made it to Hong Kong.

A few days later, I found myself on an Aeroflot flight to Moscow. The flight was not only oversold but also overcrowded. And not just by passengers, but by what seemed like hundreds of oversize horseflies. We actually roared down the runway with a standing-room-only crowd of 12 people in the aisle, desperately holding on to the sides of passengers' seats as we became airborne.

And the flies? No problem. The flight attendants apparently were used to this problem on Aeroflot, and, without even cracking a smile, walked down the aisle handing out...flyswatters! Talk about in-flight entertainment.

When it comes to airplane horror stories, I have more than my fair share. I travel nearly 400,000 miles a year, and I've seen just about everything that can go wrong when you fly. I've experienced three emergency landings. My flights have been hit by lightning five times, once so severely that it burned a grapefruit-size hole in the plane's tail. I've been on aircraft that have lost engines and other parts of the plane in midair.

And once, my flight landed safely only to be broadsided on the ground...by a catering truck. I've been laid over in London, delayed in Des Moines, marooned in Khartoum, and stuck -- more than I care to remember -- in 35E. But I've lived to tell the stories and learned a lot along the way. So this holiday season, don't put yourself blindly in the hands of the airlines, hotel chains, and car-rental companies.

Use these 21 rules of stress-free travel, and seize back a little control. You'll reduce the stress and the strain on both your mind and your wallet.