Our Voyage Home!

 

Our flight was at 10:35 in the morning, so we needed to get up and running a bit earlier today.  This was the first time on the trip we used the alarm on my phone!  That’s a sure sign that we are heading back to normal!  We got up at 6:15 (Andrea a bit earlier) and were downstairs for our breakfast reservation at 7:00.  It was actually fairly busy.  The food was fine……scrambled eggs, bacon, coffee, juice and croissants from the buffet. Per our plan (I will suggest here that this plan always receives a great deal of discussion and negotiation) we were a bit ahead of schedule by checking out of the hotel at 7:40.  Please also be aware that our ‘plan’ always has a few contingencies……but as we were close to the airport on a Sunday morning, the risks were reduced.

We were welcomed into a rainy Sunday morning in the parking lot, already an obstacle course of puddles!  We got the car packed and plugged in Google Maps…….14 minutes to the car drop off at Hertz. The route was actually a nice one over some back roads, a bit of a surprise as we were only 7 miles from the airport.  All went smoothly except for the phone took us to car rentals rather than returns at Hertz, but Andi caught it all through the airport signage.  We got our car inspected and received a ‘thumbs up’ from the attendant.  We asked if there was a shuttle bus due to the rain……but no luck.  We had about a half mile walk to the terminal.  We remembered much of this from our arrival to Edinburgh, but the car drop-off area was even further out!  With our rather heavy suitcases, we started rolling!  It was a bit of the same game as the parking lot dodging puddles for the first 10 minutes.  We then reached the same canopy covering we had walked under before…….much better to be out of the rain!

Finally in the terminal we were able to track down the delta luggage area fairly quickly. Amazingly, we were able to walk right up to a counter and get our luggage checked in.  We must have been a bit early because he told us the flight was pretty full today.  They have a strange system here where you get your luggage checked and tagged…….then you have to put it on the conveyer yourself, about 20 feet away.  We said ciao to our bags and headed off for security.

The security lines also moved quite smoothly, until my carry on bag was pulled out for inspection.  It carried almost all of our adapters, power cords, converters and extension cords…….so probably looked like a case of wires!  Anyway, after a bit of a delay it turned out to be the mouse for my laptop that was the suspicious character!  We then had a rather reasonable walk out to our gate……wandering slowly through the duty free shopping area.  I have to admit I got talked into a local gin that the salesman convinced me was a real ‘steal.’  Who knows, but it had a very nice bottle!  Andrea found a couple of small things and we were at the gate about 45 minutes earlier than our planning had anticipated!  Haha, we could have slept until 7:00!

Boarded the plan on time……..and the flight managed to leave early, even in the rain.  We decided since the flight  and was relatively short, that we would try Premium Select seats.  They worked out just fine, with a fair amount of room, a good lunch, wine and nice headphones.  We watched “Boys in the Boat,” which lived up to its reviews…….a fun movie to watch on a plane!

That left a couple of hours for trying to catch up on the blog writing.  Unfortunately the wifi on the plane was not offering much cooperation from the north Atlantic…….so I am hanging out with just my laptop and keyboard.

The flight was amazingly smooth! No turbulence at all!  What a nice way to fly.  We arrived in Boston on schedule and Fiske met us at the airport.  There’s not much more to say other than that bittersweet entanglement…….sad that the trip as at closure, but also very happy to be home again.  Ciao!