Travel woes part 1

Yesterday I was scheduled to fly out of Austin at 1pm and catch a connection to New York's LaGuardia at 4:30, but had planned to try and get there earlier by flying standby on one of several other options. Well, I bolted right after my class and got to Austin in good time. The winds were lashing on my drive over which I knew would not bode well for my flight. Just a bad feeling all around. The wind was so bad I could barely keep the car in my lane and it looked like a sandstorm across the long-term parking lots!

I managed to get onto an earlier flight that was scheduled to leave at 12:15. All of my heavy carry-on luggage was a little bit of a hassle but we managed to shove it in an overhead bin and I felt relieved for a minute. As we taxied out, the plane came to a stop out on the tarmac and the captain came on to say that we would be "significantly delayed" due to the high winds. They kept us on the plane hoping that conditions would change. DFW was down to 1 runway because the winds in Dallas were even worse than in Austin. Maybe 30 minutes later, they turned the plane around to let us off with an updated time of 3:30. Of course, I was thinking I should have stuck with my original flight, but it's just as well since that one ended up getting canceled altogether!

Weather improved and we were back on the plane at 2 and I proceeded to sit on the worse 45 minute flight of my life. The winds knocked our plane around for the entire journey and my nerves were shot by the time we arrived in Dallas. Now, I love to travel and have done a ton of flying in my lifetime, but I am not the best flyer. The landing had my stomach in knots and I had never felt more relieved to land in one piece. But that was only the beginning of the adventure!

As it turns out, due to all the delays, I ended up on my same originally scheduled flight which was supposed to leave DFW at 4:30. Better than nothing except that it was also delayed as a result of the chain reaction from all the other earlier delays in and out of DFW. I looked around at all the people waiting at the gate and noticed alot of young professionals, no doubt consultants trying to get home on a Thursday evening, and thinking geez, this is gonna be my life soon. It was kind of a dreary thought. At that point I was only delayed about an hour and 15 minutes, so no big deal. By 6:20 I was finally on the plane - had to gate check my bag which was a pain but at least I didn't have to deal with shoving it in an overhead bin. I was thinking it would have been nice to have priority access!

But wait, we taxi out and the captain turns off the engines. Weather is deteriorating at LaGuardia. Well, expected weather at LaGuardia in 3 hours is supposed to be bad. So the estimated delay is 45 minutes just sitting on the plane. Finally around 7:30 we take off and again, it is a horrible flight. Bumpy for much of it, take off and landing both rough. But I finally made it to New York, 3 hours later than planned and perhaps with a few more gray hairs, but safe and sound. By 11:30 I was happily in B's arms and ready to forget about the day and take New York by storm!!