And so it begins.....the chronicles of the epic summer vacation from which Kurt and I have just returned. 12 days really isn't that long of a time, but we packed so much into that period that detailing all the moments seems like a daunting task. Plus, on our flight back home, Kurt was loading all our photos onto his laptop and we totaled up how many each of us had taken. I clocked in at over 600 shots! Woo hoo! My celebration was short lived because Kurt more than doubled my count. Needless to say, I've got a ton of photos to sort through and assemble some sort of recollection of our fabulous European adventure. So bear with me! These posts may take some time.
How it all began...July 13th:
Don't we look like expert travelers!? Well, I feared our travel experience was doomed from the start when Delta called at 3 in the afternoon to tell me that my 10pm flight would now be leaving at 12:30am. Great. Kurt and I killed some time in the evening and then loaded ourselves onto the Long Island Railroad to connect to the AirTrain to take us to JFK. If it were just me, I would have taken a cab, but Kurt is teaching me the virtues of frugality. I'll probably thank him one day. We finally find our way to the correct terminal and this is the scene we are greeted with:
Absolute mayhem. I have a theory that JFK is severely understaffed at this time of night and the Delta check-in was a disaster. I have no idea where all these people were going and why they were taking all their worldly possessions with them. I've never seen so many bags and families of 10 traveling together! Kurt and I breezed through the check-in process at a kiosk but then had to drop off our bags to be checked. We begrudgingly got in this enormous line labeled "Baggage Check" and settled in for the long haul. Luckily, traveling makes me nervous and we were there with time to spare. I hope Kurt will thank me someday.
So we waited. And waited. And waited. This line was going nowhere fast. Occasionally, some inept Delta employee would ask someone in line where they were flying and if they had a boarding pass. If their answers satisfied her, she would move them to this miracle line that moved smoothly and quickly. How I wished to be in that line. We waited some more. The time cushion I had built in to our travel plan was slowly dwindling and we were getting antsy. Finally, the Delta lady sees us looking pitiful and asks us where we were flying. Apparently Zurich satisfied her criteria and she rescued us from baggage check hell. We checked our bags in with no problem and proceeded on to security.
We found our gate and had maybe 5 minutes to sit down. I surveyed the crowd we would be spending the next 8+ hours with. In the pack was a huge group of middle school students. Great. At this moment I was thankful for the multiple sleeping pills I had packed. Once loaded on the plane, we probably sat on the runway for another hour or so. I'm beginning to doubt the competence of Delta. Finally, we take off on our way to Kurt's motherland. Delta offers us a complementary drink for all the delays (thanks a lot). I enjoy a beer with my sleeping pill and drift off to dream of lovely Italian towns, endless Nutella, yummy pizza, and delicious wine. Oh, yes. Lots of wine :)
Day 2 coming soon!
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