England Day 1: Travel

As you can guess, I didn't sleep well the night before we left. I was so excited, but also incredibly nervous. I had never been so far away from home before, and I have never been away from Brian and the girls for so long. I also had no idea what to expect, or what was in store for me in the the next two weeks.

Our flight was suppose to leave from Las Vegas at 11:30. We were to have a short, 40 minute, layover in Detroit, MI. The plane was scheduled to land at Heathrow International airport, in London, at about 7:30 the next morning, September 22.

Brian got a call for a job the night before I was so leave, so we decided that I would drive the swagger wagon (the mini van) to the airport. He would get a ride to the airport later that afternoon, and bring it home so that we wouldn't have to pay for airport parking. I was up, of course, when he left. I then went over my bags about 900 times, paced the house 900 times, checked facebook 900 times and at 8:00 drove around the corner to pick up Patricia. We were allowing 3 1/2 hours to get there, and get checked in. Everything was going according to plan.

Then I got a flat tire on the freeway. During rush hour.

I can't change a tire. I guess it's one of those things that I should really learn how to do. Patricia had no idea how to change a tire either. I called Brian, but he was in Boulder City and there was no way that he would reach us in time for us to catch our flight. Patricia, Brian, and myself tried calling everyone we could think of, but since it was a Tuesday, everyone was at work.

So we called a taxi. Apparently, taxis are not allowed to pick up people on the freeway. So we called a tow truck, thinking if he could drive us to the repair shop, we could call a taxi from there. The soonest a tow truck could be there was 45 minutes. Not fast enough. We were really starting to panic.

Luckily, Brian got a hold of our friend Hyrum, and he was able to get us to the airport. We left the car on the side of the road, and Brian picked it up a couple of hours later when he was done with the Boulder City job. We got to the airport about an hour and 15 minutes before our flight.

We got checked in, checked our bags, made it through security and sat down feeling relieved that we had made it! Then we got called to the ticket counter.

Our flight had been delayed. Because of the delay, it meant that we would miss our connecting flight in Detroit. I was starting to think that God just really did not want me to go on this trip. But then they told me that they had worked out some different flights for us. We were to leave two hours later, on a plane to Minneapolis, MN. There would be a two hour layover, and then we would catch our connecting flight to Heathrow. We would land in London at about noon the next day, instead of 7:30. That really messed up our plans to tour London upon landing. We weren't to happy about that, but decided we could live with it as long as we could get on a dang plane! Then, the lady told us that to compensate us for our troubles, they were upgrading us to the exit row (more room) on our domestic flight and to first class on the international flight! We was positive that we could live with that!

We finally boarded our new plane. We took off, and landed without any further problems.

After landing, we had a couple of hours to kill, so we got a cup of coffee and chilled in the terminal waiting to board our plane to England. It seemed like FOREVER. Then, they announced that it had been delayed. I was not a very happy camper at this point. Luckily, it was only delayed about 45 minutes, and we would still land in London at the scheduled time.

By the time we were finally able to board the plane, it was about 9:00 PM (7:00 Vegas time). I hadn't really slept in over 24 hours, I had spent all day sitting around airports - I was really tired and ornery! But once we saw our seats on the plane, I felt alot happier! First class is AWESOME! There was two seats in the same space that fits three in coach, and there was so much leg room! You didn't feel cramped at all. The best part was, that the seats laid down flat, into a bed. And we got real pillows and blankets, instead of those crappy fleece throws and travel pillows that they have in coach. We were greeted on the plane with Champagne and orange juice! And when it came to the dinner, we were handed an actual menu, and served a three course meal with real silverware (not plastic) and cloth napkins. Being in first class made the next 8+ hours go by alot faster! I was actually able to get a couple of hours of sleep too!