Anatomy of a Nightmare

Every week, the Travel section receives dozens of e-mails from readers asking for help with trips gone bad. Cara Lanza's tale of woe stood out. As the busy holiday travel season approaches, let's see if we can learn from her little fiasco.

As any seasoned traveler knows, the question is not whether your chances of encountering airline snafus are high; it's how to avoid or at least mitigate the problems. To that end, we deconstruct what Cara Lanza of the District calls her "horrendous travel situation."

We thought we'd heard it all, but we're singling out Lanza's tale because it's so deliciously nightmarish, summarizing as it does many of the things that can go wrong on a trip.

It all sounded so wonderful in the planning stages: A trip from Washington to Italy's Amalfi Coast in June, beginning with a flight to Newark and a connecting flight to Rome. In Rome, Lanza would meet up with three friends, stay the night, then take a leisurely drive to the coast -- all part of a 40th birthday celebration for one of the group. Lanza had saved for months for the high-end resort from which the friends would explore the coast and visit such dreamy towns as Capri, Ravello and Positano.

Instead, here's what happened: A missed connection resulted in Lanza's spending a night on an airport floor, hours in lines, more hours on the phone and $641 in extra expenses. She also lost more than $200 on a prepaid hotel room in Rome that she never got to use. A two-flight itinerary turned into four flights and a $206.91 cab ride. She lost about three days of her week-long vacation and made a mistake that probably will cost her more than $7,000. Most of what was left of her truncated vacation was spent without luggage, which arrived the day before she was scheduled to leave.

Distraught, disappointed and hoping to recoup at least some of her losses, Lanza turned to The Post for help. To read more about her experience and what she could have done to prevent at least some of the mishaps, see Page P6.