An “Adventurous” Trip

There is a phrase I used to use with my children when we were traveling and something went wrong. "This is what you call an adventure, dear!" My adventure started at 8am GMT.

Toby drove me to Bristol Airport and since he had never been there before, there was much map consulting both before we left and one time along the way. The roads were narrow and winding and if I hadn’t been sitting in the front, I would have definitely been queasy! There were long waits when I got there but that I expected. There are always long waits these days to get on board an overseas flight. I bought a paperback  and a packer of Malteasers {malted milk balls.} 

When I got my ticket,  I checked on my seat and found it was a window seat. I prefer aisle seats because although I love looking out of the window of a plane, even more I need leg  room so I was told to ask the flight attendants and they would see of they could get my seat changed. However, when I got to my seat, I found it was right behind the bulkhead which gave me a lot of leg room and the pleasure of having a window seat, too. The "adventure" part came when I became aware that there was a seat-kicking baby in the seat behind me who was at the age when she communicated in high-pitched squeals only!  Then there was the idiot in the aisle seat on my row who clipped his iPod to the flight magazines in the rack on the bulkhead front of him then lay back with his eyes closed so that every time I wanted to get out, I had to ask him to unclip it so I could get by! I was sorely tempted to walk right through it and apologize when it crashed to the floor. Seven hours of this,,, When the plane got to Newark, I had an hour and a half to get through all the stuff one has to do to get into the US and I figured it might be a bit close but I should make it.

When one arrives from overseas, the second thing that has to be done is to claim one’s luggage {which in my case had already been ticketed through to Burlington, Vermont. } In case you were wondering what the first thing was, it was the wait-in-line-forever experience of going through  Customs.  After that, one takes {that means walk several miles and wait in line some more} one’s baggage {yes, this would be the same bags one had ticketed through to the destination just to avoid the experience of walking several miles dragging them behind you} to the place where the luggage is gathered up to be sent to wherever in the States it is ticketed to.     

In addition to all this stuff {which I expected having made this trip several times}, the plane landed at Concourse A and the next plane I had to catch left for Gate-right-at-the-farthest-end of Concourse C which I didn’t expect. I would have made the connection except that I and one other woman were left waiting when all the baggage was taken off the carousel until an apologetic young man went away to find out what had happened to my one green bag and two of her bags. She was very upset because she was going on to Lima, Peru, and kept on and on about how she could not manage without these bags. I was full of sympathy until she revealed that one was full of her makeup! I didn’t say "Suck it up, lady!" with an eye-roll but I definitely thought it. I was told that I should make a baggage claim with Continental when I got to Burlington.

So, off I went with the one black bag that had come off the plane safely. I got it ticketed though {which took up still more time and then I  walked very fast  {It’s all exercise!" } for what seemed like miles but got to my gate five minutes too late to catch my plane to Boston where I was supposed to catch another plane. At this point, I had some good luck. When I explain what had happened, a very nice woman put me on a plane that went straight to Burlington AND got in an hour before I would have got in with the other one! I asked her what would happen to my luggage and  she said it would probably have gone on the two planes I was supposed to have been on! I looked a bit surprised at this because I thought that if a person didn’t get on a plane, the luggage was taken off! She said yes, that was true, but since my name was in the system showing I was going to Burlington, the luggage should go too although via a different route from me. But, if it didn’t, I could make a claim with Continental at Burlington! Ok, that means I had my carry-on bag with me and my two other pieces of luggage were being shipped around the sky!

I got to Burlington at 6:30pm EST  and called Fred to tell him I was here. I told him not to come for an hour, though, because I had to wait for my black bag to {hopefully} arrive on the plane I should have been on from Boston. At this point, I went back to look at the baggage carousel where the luggage from the through flight from Newark to Burlington was and there, to my to surprise and amazement, was the missing green bag that had not been on the plane I had been on from Bristol in the UK to Newark, NJ! And, since this is a story with a happy ending, ten minutes or so after Fred arrived to pick me up, there was my black bag too!

It is very  nice to be home again!