Airplane Love Stories

by HowAboutWe 1

We're happy to present this excerpt from one of our favorite sites, HowAboutWe. With the holidays being a busy traveling season, you may just end up sitting next to your soul mate on the airplane. Check out these four stories of how love blossomed for couples after a chance meeting.

If you're already going to be at the airport, why don't you do some multitasking and use it to meet your next romantic fling? Meeting someone special on a plane is rare enough to be the stuff of fantasy, yet just commonplace enough that nearly everyone knows someone who found sparks with a seatmate at 30,000 feet. Here are some real-life tales of strangers on a plane turning into lovers on the ground.

Patrick and Lina

Flying back to the states after my first trip to Brazil, I was seated next to Lina. A flight attendant had asked me to move from my assigned seat to allow an elderly couple to sit together. The attendant sat me in the middle of a large group of Brazilian women on their way to the states to start their au pair assignments. Normally this would have been a dream seat, but after 36 straight hours of performing, partying, and traveling all I wanted to do was sleep. All these Brazilian women wanted to do was try out their English on an American.

Lina was an English teacher, so her English was quite good. We talked for the majority of the 11-hour flight. When we weren’t talking, she was sleeping on my shoulder. As we exited the plane, she realized she left her purse at her seat. I waited for her as she retrieved her purse. Meanwhile, both of our parties headed to the baggage claim. As we made our way to our separate customs, I gave her my contact information. I figured I would never hear from her, but recognized a special connection was made and wanted to keep the possibility there. She did, in fact, come and visit for a week, and we had a great time. I introduced her to baseball, American beer, and ice cream. This started an on-and-off relationship that lasted five years. I always knew that the relationship was going to either lead to a life together or go down in flames. It did the latter.

Melanie Finds Love

Last year, I flew to the West Coast for a dance workshop. I had an aisle seat on my second flight and I arrived in my row first. A few minutes later, a young man said, "Excuse me," and I got up to let him into the window seat. I was relieved that someone who seemed to be near my age was sitting with me. Nobody else came to our row, and the seat between us stayed empty. For the final hour of the flight, we spoke nonstop, learning about each other.

He was new to the area to which we were both flying back, as I had been not many years before. I offered to show him around sometime if he was interested. We exchanged numbers. I have repeatedly told him that I was not flirting, but simply being friendly. The relationship started out slowly, and I just had the greatest time hanging out and talking with him wherever we went. This is the happiest I have been in a long time, and I cannot wait to spend my life with this wonderful man.

For more travel love connections, head to HowAboutWe: How to Meet Your Next Date on an Airplane

— Laura Schaefer

Check out more great stories from HowAboutWe:

• How to Picnic at 30,000 Feet
• Confessions of a Travel Fling Junkie
• The Five Greatest Time Travel Romances