An Eventful Weekend

The plan was to fly to Raleigh at 7:02 PM on Friday, August 30th. This was the cheapest place to fly to. Flying basic economy was less than half of the cost of regular economy on American Airlines. This was the worst flying experience that I had since June, 2014, when I lost two flights. We boarded on time, but the plane did not take off. At around 7:20 PM the pilot told us that there were three mechanical failures, and only two of them were fixed. After almost an hour we were told that we had to deplane and that AA would look for a different plane. Our new departure time was changed to 11:11 PM. Our new gate was next to the AA customer service desk for stranded customers. Our departure gate was moved to a different terminal. There was another customer service desk a few yards away from our new gate. I lined up to get a food voucher, as the line was short. As I waited in line my flight was moved to 5:00 AM. I asked the lady if I could get taxi vouchers. I was told that as I lived there, instead of getting a hotel and taxi voucher, that I should simply send them the Uber receipts.

I slept for about two hours and took a shower. The flight was moved from 5:00 AM to 6:00 AM. We boarded on time, but waited at the tarmac for over 3 hours as we had a mechanical failure (this was a different plane). The issue was fixed, but the crew was incomplete. After a more than 14-hour delay, we left right after 9:00 AM the following morning. I missed two museums that I wanted to visit, but I was able to rush and see the following places in Raleigh, Chapel Hill, and Durham:

The following morning I took a train to Charlotte. Not much to see:

This is one of the trips that I almost wish I would not have taken. I took a train back to Raleigh in order to fly back to Dallas the following morning. 

I will not travel all the way up there to see the two museums that I missed in Raleigh, but maybe a fall foliage drive might change these plans at the end of October (perhaps in a few years). 

I emailed customer relations and they refunded my first night's hotel, my two extra Ubers, and I was also offered 7,500 miles for the inconvenience. I still wish everything would've gone according to plan. I'm wondering if I would've been offered more miles if I would've paid for an economy seat.