Well I hope this is the final chapter in this particular part of our adventure.

It took another day for me to confirm slightly different dates and times that would work for my boys. After dinner I went to work on the RBC travel site sorting out some flight options. Looks like for us, Delta is the only way to get to SXM. Boys travel down together a couple of days later than anticipated. One stays a week, one can only stay for 6 days having to get back to school.

I call up RBC Travel for help booking because two related trips/travellers with slightly different dates is a booking challenge. As well, I still would like to use the points that I have saved up and had used for the now-cancelled AC flights, and are now in points refund limbo. After all, that's why I pay these credit card fees year after year.

After being on hold listening to that awkward music for a while I am amused to get connected to the same agent that dealt with me on Tuesday - the one that I ended up conferencing in with the Air Canada agent. She remembered me, and even remembered the name of the agent from Air Canada. She told me that she was going to set up a special credit note for the points such that when they were credited to my account for the cancelled Air Canada flights, I could later use them to refund the cash that I would have to pay for these Delta flights that I have picked out for the boys. She couldn't book the flights for me though, for some reason I could not understand in my growing exhaustion with this matter; I have to call Delta to book.

I call Delta and get the nicest, most patient agent one could hope for. It was a bit tricky booking these flights for the boys with different dates, first purchasing one boy's trip, then the others, then getting them seated together on the way down, then getting the one boy home alone, and the other one seated with us on the way back. Turns out there's only one reasonable set of flights YYZ>SXM on Delta, same flight numbers every day connecting in Atlanta. We're all on the same set of flights, on several different days.

I was on the phone with Audrey the Agent for an hour and a quarter, during which time we became pals. I have always said you get more flies with honey; if you're nice, patient, and friendly with customer service people on the phone, you often get service that exceeds expectations. I eventually got all the flights just as I needed them, all slightly upgraded to Delta Comfort+, and it all came out a little less money than I had thought it would based on my online shopping of earlier in the evening. It was crazy how the prices of the boys tickets bounced around $50 or $60 up and down as we kept slightly juggling the options. I told Audrey I'd buy her lunch when she finally realizes her dream to visit Canada.

So this trip to SXM has been a pretty big pain-in-the-neck so far with all of our flights having been booked, cancelled and re-booked. After all this we are excited to get back to this place that we enjoy so much, and with our boys. We're thinking this may be our last family trip together for some time as at least one will be striking out in his own after school ends in April. And really, I can't complain too much about the pain-in-the-neck; this inconvenience is really a first-world problem. In then end, I still have a house and a business, something that so many on SXM cannot say right now.

I keep wondering what Orient Village/Beach is going to be like by the time we get there in a little less than 4 months. Daily reports of things re-opening is quite encouraging, but it is still going to be nothing like the place we have grown to know so well.