Planes, Ferrys and Automobiles... the looong trip home

What a day… pretty much 16 hours of travel and much more draining that we thought it would be. We need a vacation from our trip home. J

We start off early and get all our stuff together, put the house back together, make sandwiches and pack up the rest of the fruit from the frig into our cheap little Wal-Mart cold pack bag and we pack up the car. There is a journal in the house that the owners have asked renters to write in and say what we did, what we recommend to others – and of course we rave about Dajio, Café Atlantic and the slushies. Just as we were sitting around because we were ready just a little early (we’re that good), Dana notices something shiny in Patti’s hair… and it’s moving. Patti freaks – just a little – and not inappropriately.. It’s a little termite like bug that we had spotted in the house the first day – maybe it’s a 7 day bug cycle. That is out cue to leave.

Packing up the car..

BM needs one last slushie before we leave so we go by the shop and she gets her freshly squeezed orange juice slushie. We wait in the car and we see a new group of people renting out bikes. That’s the cycle of the island here, all the houses rent for 7 days, from either Saturday to Saturday or Sunday to Sunday, so the locals definitely get into a rhythm – I wonder if that was engineered like that or just happened organically. It seems like something that may be written into bi-laws, if you have a rental house you must rent in 7 day increments, makes life less of a hassle I guess. Expect the new dingbatters on Sat or Sunday. They have a new local radio station here and they mention, “So a lot of you all are probably leaving on Saturday”… we were first introduced to it when our captain played it on the boat, and then we saw them advertising it by riding around in the back of a pickup truck in drag and since then we’ve been listening to it in the car. It’s got a great variety of songs you never hear – reminds us of “The Wood” put out by Lindenwood University – wish we could get it at home..

The Slushie stand...

We make it safely to the ferry check in by 9:20 and there are lots of puppies and kids stretching their legs. There are also a pair of ducks waddling around just in case anyone wants to feed them; one little girl in a sun dress, maybe about 3, just loves chasing them.

At about 10:15 we start loading the ferry and point out to BM that we're getting on the ferry so that she knows that we're on a boat this time, and we’re leaving the dock by 10:30. We head up to the sun deck and BP spots a dolphin! No lie! The ferry ride is about 2 hours long and some of us nap in the air-conditioned lounge, Patti naps in the car - and then I went back out to the car and Patti and I ate the sandwiches we packed and some of the watermelon. It was a yummy treat, and the wal-mart cooler bag has really paid off. We've used it a lot this week. Best $2 we ever spent.

Waiting to board the ferry...

Hanging out on the sun deck

This guy fed the gulls out of his hand..

We’re driving back a different way than we came, instead of driving north up the outer banks and crossing at the bridge at Roanoke Island, we’re taking a two hour ferry straight over from Ocracoke and then driving 3-4 hours northwest to Raleigh. We have swamp on both sides so we're on the lookout for swamp people again. Our boat captain was explaining how they set nets to catch fish and BM chimed in, that's how the swamp people catch alligators. The captain watches it too, "Oh you watch that?"..

We're listening to the CD that the girls bought, and it sounds like he's saying "funky donkey spanker".. We'll have to look up the lyrics….. ok… I’m back. We looked up the lyrics. And he is in fact saying “funky donkey spanker”.. Hmmm. But we like him, he’s a little Jack Johnsonish.

We've got the AC on and I'm lovin it. Patti's mom always says, "Susen loves AC" (and my dogs do too). BM who is usually with me is turning the vents off, "I'm used to island weather now, the AC is cold." She’s become a native in one week. We started off with small winding roads surrounded by water when we got off the ferry, and we head inland further and further we start to see more signs of civilization. We see some shops that we turn into slap happy laugh riots – even the back seat is concerned about our sanity. There is one tanning place called “Season's Tanning” – that doesn’t even make sense to me… I turn it into like a “Season’s Greeting!”… Merry christmas, season's tanning! – and it’s in New Bern, not Old bern, or sun burn, or wind burn, not even slow burn. We hate a slow burn - give me a fast burn anytime! And by the end of that we could barely breathe we were laughing so hard. Road weary. Slap happy.

We hit a stretch of road and this strong smell of peanut butter hits me… Do you smell peanut butter? Patti smells it… BM smells it… Dana and BP do not. It continues and it’s really strong. Are you sure you guys aren’t eating peanut butter or something – this is distinctly nutty. This goes on for a while, until Dana pipes in – well I was eating these caramelized roasted cashews… but that was 5 min ago. OH! Well, I can see how you didn’t think that us smelling peanuts had anything to do with you eating cashew NUTS… that would be ridiculous. Probably completely unrelated. J

Continuing inland the roads are getting bigger, and we spot the true sign of civilization – a Burger King. We stop and get drinks, some of us get food. BM notes that this is her first meal in a week that doesn’t have anything to do with fish.

Other roadside attractions… Chubby Nubby's... it’s an antique store. What an unfortunate name. And why for an antique store? Why for ANY store? We drive by a Mr. Waffles that is in extreme disrepair.. We think of him and Mrs. Waffles and hope they're doing ok now. We think they might have fared better if they were “Mr. Creme Brulee French toast”.

BM is OUT - we're laughing, being loud, yelling "big fat cow!" And nothing. I tickle her leg and she wakes long enough to give me a death look, but still can't put two words together. She is dazed and confused, but I’m entertained.

On the road again

We finally make it to the airport and return the car. It’s 4:30, and our flight is at 6:30. While we’re checking our bags BM falls in love with sweet older lady who just happens to be sporting an awesome silver mullet. It’s like Carol Brady except that it’s curled under instead of flipped out. I never really appreciated how the flip made that look work until I’ve seen it curled under. We head through security and we have a ninja warrior in our midst – he has been creeping his way up closer in line, and he’s now in the middle of our group. We’re just circled (facing each other) as we chat in line and it makes it really obvious that this man is standing in the middle of our group. When it’s time to split into two lines he makes his move and gets ahead…. But then forgets to take off his belt and has to go back, and then forgets his shoes and has to go back, and each time he rebuts in line in a different place. Just as we’re walking up to the metal detector – it breaks. We all have to go through the full body scan – I was just talking to BP about it and saying that she would probably be selected for it because she’s ALWAYS selected to get the full body rub down, she says it’s because of all the metal bobbie pins in her hair – and now we’re all going through it. Oh yay. They have a sign to show us what it really looks like, and they explain that the person that looks at the images is located in a different place. I guess that’s so they can laugh openly without offending anyone. One guy is ready to go through and the guard sees his boarding pass in his pocket and tells him, “nothing in your pockets”… the guy continues with a flow of questions… “not my boarding pass…(searching through pockets)… what about my wallet?” (guard, “no”)… “no change?”… (nothing in your pockets)… “not my I.D.?” Are you kidding me right now? NOTHING IN YOUR POCKETS! NOTHING!!

We’re excited because we’re at gate C1… yay! No walking all over the dang place! We settle in – some get food, but BP and I hold out because we were going to eat in Atlanta because we have a layover there and just had Burger King not that long ago. We’re at our gate, and it still says St. Louis – but it’s 5:55, and no sign of boarding our 6:30 flight. Patti happens to check the flight board and she sees that our gate has been changed. We’re now at C9 – but there has been no announcement. I was a little crabby – hoping that we’re now not behind on boarding, it’s almost 6. So we talk and maybe we talk about it a little louder to let off our crabbiness (really it’s all about the lack of communication). We get over to the new gate and there is no one boarding, no one even waiting to board – so we think they’re all already on the plane. We go up and ask and we are gestured to the seats.. still no communication. We see people from our previous gate start to trickle over. We think that we started the move because they still haven’t said that our gate has changed. Someone in the group notices that there is a lightening cloud picture next to “Atlanta” and Dana goes up to ask. It’s now about 6:30. Our flight time. And Finally, an announcement – our flight in delayed (really?, shocked) – there are severe storms in Atlanta and all flights in and out are on hold, we’ll get an update on the weather in 20 minutes. That’s fine – our flight out of Atlanta isn’t until 10:10, and our flight in is only an hour long, so as long we leave by 8:00 we should be fine (we’re counting on the fact that Atlanta is a ginormous airport and we’ll need extra time to get to our departing gate).

Since it now looks like our layover in Atlanta is now gone, I decide to go get some food. It’s 6:30, and everything is closing. My options are the packaged sandwiches at the newsstand or a $15 pizza from California Pizza Kitchen – I opt for the pizza. We kill time by playing spades. We have several annoying people around us and we’re trying to block them out. Kids who apparently have no parents are screaming in our ears, Ninja is on our flight, and so is silver mullet… . We have a VERY knowledgeable chatty Kathy next to us. I gauge her at about 26 and she is travelling for “business” and just has the answer to everything under the sun. While we’re playing spade BM is acting as a kind of receiver for all info.. When the kids scream, she also screams… like completely unconsciously… when the chatty Kathy makes a statement of knowledge, BM responds under her breath “Oh I didn’t know that, that’s interesting… “ She has to stop. It takes some doing to get her to snap out of it. Travel weary, and slap happy. It’s been 35 minutes… and no announcement. Dana goes up to check and voila, announcement. He doesn’t know when we’re leaving. Duh. We keep watching our departure time update on the gate info… we’re now at an 8pm departure. Which turned into an actual 9pm departure.

BM and BP trying to look upset about our delayed flight to Atlanta...

We start to board and the ninja has parkoured his way up in the line (Parkour!). I mention in my normal voice, that we all have assigned seats and we’re not going anywhere until everyone is on. Those that the ninja has cut in front of look at us and smile like, “right?”… we’re a little nervous about the really tight connection now, they’re guessing we’ll land at 9:30 (which is another lie because we don’t get out until 9:00 and it’s an hour flight) and we have a connecting flight at 10:10. During the flight Patti asks about the tight connection and she reassures us that we’ll be fine, that every flight in and out was effected, so they’ll all be delayed. She has another flight at 10:10 and it’s been delayed to 12:10. We’re happy to hear that we probably won’t miss the flight, but not thrilled about leaving 2 hours later. Mixed feelings.

We arrive at 10:00 and learn the flight is delayed to 10:35 (perfect!)... And then flight time on the gate changes to 10:50 (no announcement again – is this just a Delta thing? I’ve never had such a lack in communication)... It changes again… 11:06....Then 11:10.... Just tell me 11:30 and surprise me when we leave early. They announce that we're just waiting on a flight crew. The plane is ready and we're ready - we'll see what time we actually get out.

Snacks at the Atlanta airport...

. We got out about 11:15, after our flight attendant tried to ease our stress by telling us jokes (?!). We’ve had delay after delay, we’re sitting at the gate ready to pull back from the gate (we’ve already done the seat belt and exit demo) and she talks to us in a really high pitched squeaky/scratchy voice that reminds me of Rae Dawn Chong’s character “Squeak” in The Color Purple (if you know it then you know what I’m talking about), thanking her “first class passengers especially for continuing to chose Delta… but really everyone from the very front to the very back – thanks for picking Delta and she hopes that we all select Delta again (there are audible groans from coach)… and then she says that she wants to get us to St. Louis and she know that we want to get there because she’s heard that they had great BBQ, but she’s from Texas so she’s not too sure about that, and besides the KC BBQ (she misspeaks and apparently thinks we’re now going to KC)… I mean St. Louis BBQ… blah, blah, blah…. and she’s read this study about the stress of travelers (more groans) because of delays and weather and flight attendants….. it’s getting awkwardly long, a long time ago… so she wants to relieve our stress by telling us jokes. WHAT? Can’t we please just leave? She tells us about 10 jokes of the caliber of “What do you call cheese that is not yours?” (nacho cheese), and “How much does it cost for a pirate to get his ears pierced?” (A buck-an-ear)… a guy about 2 rows in front of me shouts, “SHUT UP!”… our sentiments exactly. She finally steps away from the open mic night, and we take off. It’s 11:15, 90 minute flight and we’re home!

We land in STL (and we got our hour back), so its 11:45. And we've just been told we'll be sitting here for at least another 20min because another plane is still at our gate. Very frustrating. 35 minutes later we get another update… they don’t want to tell us a time because he doesn’t want to lie to us (again)… I’m not the only person thinking that there is probably an open gate somewhere at this airport and that after delay upon delay it might be good customer service to do everything they can to just get us off this friggin plane asap. At 12:30 we finally start to de-plane (De plane! De plane!)… Scott has been communicating with us through facebook while we’ve been sitting there, and he greets his wife (who is now very crabby like the rest of us). We get to baggage claim, and we wait a really long time before get our bags. Too long. But we do finally get them and we head our separate ways – taxi home for me and Patti; Dana’s dad is picking her up; Scott is driving BP and BM home and then BP has her own drive home…. It was a blast time, and I wouldn’t want to be on island time with ferry hair and crabby in the airport with any other people.

Until next year blog!

You missed it!! J