It is nearly 6AM and I am awake. Not unsual for the jet-lagged traveler, however I really thought my tired body would want to sleep more than four hours after 24 hours awake with only an hour-long nap between three flights.
We are in Florence, Kentucky, where our travels all began, the day after our ski retreat (remember that?). This is good. How we got here is another story though. And perhaps the lack of sleep has magnified some of our little travel hiccups to be more than they are, but who among us doesn't like to share these kinds of stories we experience?
Our little adventure was probably inevitable when our flight from Munich was late leaving because we were waiting on passengers from Italy and Poland to join us. Then, because there was an inch of snow on the ground and it was 'snowing' (which was not even visible out of my plane window -- there would be an occasional drop of precipitation on the window that melted away within seconds), we had to go through a 30+ minute full de-icing of the plane.
Upon on arriving in Newark (late, of course) we made it through passport control and waiting for our bags. Eventually four of them arrived. Then, a full 15 minutes after that, the last bag arrived. How they got separated, we don't know.
Then, for some reason we cannot figure out (including the customs folks who had to go through our bags), a screener insisted we go through agricultural inspection (the little doggie did not find anything to get excited about in our luggage -- we know better than that). ARGH!!!
Now we were down to 35 minutes before the departure of our last leg of the journey and we still had to re-check our bags. That went quickly but by the time we got to our terminal, the TSA agent informed us that we did not have boarding passes (which may not have been so surprising to us had we not been so tired and stressed). Apparently (I was entertaining children during check-in at the beginning of our journey so I was clueless), Lufthansa in Tirana didn't have the capability to print us passes for the last leg of the journey so now in Newark we had to go up a level to visit the ticket counter.
Now things were looking bleak. The ticket counter calls the gate. The gate says they will wait, but due to the time the ticket counter couldn't print us boarding passes, only cards to get us through security. We have a glimmer of hope. They wave us to the head of the line so we are screened for the fourth time that day. I tell Dad, "It will all work out. Don't worry!" Mom and the kids finish screening first, so they run ahead of us to the gate. Minutes later, we arrive at our gate breathless to see the jetway being pulled away from the aircraft and no sign of Mom and the kids. After several minutes of confusion, they show up (Mom went to the wrong gate), but it didn't make any difference, it was too late.
It's a little before 8PM and our options our few. There are no more flights to Cincinnati the rest of the evening. We could a.) get two rooms at the airport Marriott ($$$) and try again at 6:30 in the morning or b.) try to fly into another nearby city like, say, Dayton?
With little time to think, we agree to be re-booked on the flight to Dayton. We already had a paid hotel reservation for the night in Florence and a full schedule of appointments here in Cincinnati on Tuesday morning and since our bags were already tagged and headed to Cincinnati, it seemed like the best way to not further disrupt any more plans would be to go to Dayton and figure things out from there.
Minutes before boarding the flight to Dayton, Nathan finds an option for a minivan in Dayton that won't break the bank to get us from Dayton to Florence (possibilities had included a charter van, taxis, as well as 2 rental cars since most rental companies were out of vans). Our cost savings from not staying in Newark had appeared to be vanishing, but Nathan found a reasonable solution.
We get to Dayton and Reni is OUT. Ellie had just fallen asleep before landing and was completely out of it. It was like she was trying to cry but didn't have the energy or tears. She kept saying pitifully, "I can't yawn! I can't yawn!"
We arrive at the rental counter to pick up our van and discover another problem.
Between the 4 of us SEASONED INT'L TRAVELERS we only had 1 drivers license (me) and 1 credit card (Mom). I know, we really should know better, but nearly 20 years of traveling to Albania and I think we can count the times we have used a credit card there on a few fingers (still a cash-based society).
Now we had a dilemma. The rental agency policy is that the credit card be in the same name as the driver. The manager came out and given that the credit card was a 'company' card (for the Foundation), they maneuvered around this little issue by requiring mom to sign off on all the paperwork too and we were soon on the road again by 11:30PM local time.
Thanks to a diet Coke from the Wendy's drive through (and the fear of being pulled over and discovered to be driving my two children passed out on their grandmother in the back seat minus carseats), I was able to stay awake relatively easily until we got to our destination around 1AM ...
Some items for prayer today...
We really need the Lord's help in locating Nathan's wallet. In his weary state last night, Nathan cannot remember if he brought it with him to Albania (which wouldn't be his normal habit, but we didn't leave on this trip from home) or if he left it with some items stashed in our van in the hotel parking lot.
A cursory exam of the van last night did not reveal the wallet. We cannot find it in any of our four carry-ons and I don't remember packing it in our checked luggage yesterday morning in Albania.
This is important because Nathan's parents arranged a rental car for him to drive up to Columbus later tonight to join them in traveling to New Jersey for his grandfather's funeral. He needs both his driver's license and a credit card to get the rental car.
It would be nice if our luggage arrived on the morning flight from Newark to Cincinnati this morning. To minimize the amount of stuff we would have to carry with us through airports (I told you we had 4 carry-ons and a stroller plus 2 kids between Nathan and I), we stuffed our bulky winter coats in our checked luggage. The temps are around freezing here in Cincinnati.
Sometime this morning we need to buy Nathan a suit for the funeral. Nathan has a suit, but it's at home, 2 hours away...
This afternoon at 3PM, Nathan and I have an appointment with the team at Cincinnati Children's to discuss Ellie's evaluation results. We are so thankful that our travel snafus haven't prevented us from missing this appointment, however it would be nice if we could wear some clean clothes to this appointment. :-)
Thank you friends and family! We'll keep you posted! Happy Valentine's Day!
1 comment:
Praying for you guys.
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