Vacations gone bad (or from hell)

[bcdphie]

The first time I attended a DPhiE convention (June 1998) was also the first time I had ever traveled alone. I was a seasoned traveler, but not by myself. I was flying from Vancouver to Norfolk, VA.

First I had to take a shuttle flight from Vancouver to SeaTac. Got to SeaTac, found my connecting flight to Charlotte - no problems - yet. Even though we left Seattle on time, we were really late getting into Charlotte, so I had to book it though the aiport, and found they were literally holding the plane for me. I got on, and continued on to Virginia. When I arrived at the airport, I found out my luggage didn't make it. So I talked to someone at baggage claim, and then made my way to my convention. Luckliy it showed up later that evening. The rest of my stay was lots of fun, but then I had to go home...

To get back to Vancouver I had to fly from Norfolk to DC, DC to Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh to Seattle, and finally Seattle to Vancouver.

There were storms up and down the East Coast that day, so everything was delayed. I made it DC, and found my flight to Pittsburgh was also late. They advised me to book myself on the later flight out of Pittsburg, but there was a chance I wouldn't get my connection back to Vancouver. At this point I decided if I was going to be stranded anywhere I'd rather be in Seattle (only a 3 hour drive from Vancouver), versus Pittsburgh. I was suppossed to work the next day, but had no clue when I would actually be home. So I called my work and explained my situation. They said they would call back, but I explained I was at an airport in DC (didn't own a cell yet), so they told me to call back in about 20 minutes. Luckily they found someone to switch shifts with me.

I made it to Pittsburgh, and actually had time to get my original flight, but because I changed flights, I couldn't get on the first flight out. Finally as we were about to leave, a big thunder storm rolled in, which we took off in. I am a terrible flyer at the best of times, so the last thing I needed was this. I was sitting next to a guy who worked for Boeing, trying explain to me that there was no scientific way this plane could crash. That didn't really help too much.

I made it to Seattle to find out the last flight to Vancouver had just left. I cried. I was so tired and just wanted to see my family and sleep in my own bed. Had I been with my husband at that time (we started dating a month later), he probably would have driven down to pick me up. But we weren't, so I was put up in a hotel overnight and was up at 5AM the next morning to get on the thirty minute flight home.

I've had some interesting times travelling since then, but nothing like that.