The Journey Home

Yesterday was tiring and hair-raising. I thought we’d made all the preparations the day before, but it turns out I was wrong.

When we headed for breakfast, we passed the Group Leader. She mentioned they were going to the reception desk to ask if they needed to fill out the customs form. I’d went to the disembarkation “lecture” and knew that they did, and told her so.

Dad and I went on up to breakfast. After we’d got our food and found a table, and I came back with our drinks, I hadn’t eaten more than a few bites until Dad asked what form the Group Leader was talking about, and did we need it?

Uh, yes, we did. I asked at least three times yesterday, “Do you have your passport, transfer voucher, e-ticket and custom form you’ll need tomorrow?” I was assured three times, yes, he did.

Obviously he didn't understand what I was talking about with the customs form, and it turned out he didn’t have it. He filled it out, but had no idea what he’d done with it. We left a half-finished breakfast and went back to see if he could find the form. He wasn’t having any luck, so I zipped down to the reception desk and got a new one, and we got it filled out.

I guess it was just as well we didn’t disembark with the first group as I’d originally planned. When I got hold of the group leader the day before and asked her where Dad could meet them, she said they were going in the “orange” group, which was the next to last group scheduled to leave the ship.

That made me nervous, but the instructions said everyone should be off the ship by 9:30am, so I figured that left an hour to get to the airport, and then two hours before my flight left, so it ought to work out okay. I'd orginially planned to go with one of the first groups off, but I knew I needed to get Dad situated with his group before leaving him.

Anyway, it ended up we had plenty of time to get a new customs form and get it filled out, and we went down near the gangway to wait our turn. When they finally called for people with orange tags, it was a madhouse. They filled two buses and had to call for a third while we stood around and waited and fretted.

Finally they got our luggage stowed on a bus and headed for the airport. When we got close, the driver informed us that he was dropping us off at a tent in a field at the end of the airport, and our luggage would be there, but while some people would be happy, there would be some of us quite unhappy. Apparently, only United and American Airlines paid the extra for this service. Dad’s group flew out on United, so they were all set.

However, for me it was a different story. I was flying on Northwest.

I told Dad goodbye, grabbed my luggage and started off at a brisk trot. The terminal was a good ways off. Worse, once I got there, I discovered the Northwest ticketing desks were at the far end. Oh man! I walked faster. I don’t know who thought of putting wheels on luggage, but bless them!!!

Of course, once I finally made it to the ticketing section for Northwest I had to wait in a long line for my turn at ticketing and getting my luggage tags. One woman was manning (woman-ing?) three stations, so it took a while but I wasn’t too worried. After that, I just needed to go through customs and find my gate.

I should have been worried.

Following the signs, I headed towards the security checkpoint. There was a sea of people in the thoroughfare. After a while, I saw a lady holding a big sign that said, “End of Line”, and realized this was a winding line of people trying to get through security and into the airport. Three cruise shops had come back to port that day, and there were LOTS of people trying to fly home.

I lost count of how many loops we made and how many times we walked back and forth in that hallway, but it took a long time to finally get up to security and work our way through. By the time I’d been checked out and had my shoes back on and ready to head for my gate, time was growing short.

Worse, my gate was at the opposite end of the terminal. I had to go down a couple sets of escalators, ride a tram, and walk clear to end of that section to find the right gate. I breathed a sigh of relief when I made it and saw the sign still up for the flight to Memphis. I immediately called Jess to tell him I’d made it, and had no sooner started talking when they called for boarding of first class passengers.

That was a little too close for comfort.

Fortunately, my connection in Memphis was more of a stop over. Most passengers got off, but a few of us were going on through to Nashville. I got off long enough to stretch my legs. Over 4 hours in the same little seat seems like a very long time. The stretch from Memphis to Nashville was short though, and I was finally on the ground back in Tennessee, and boy, was it great to see Jess! We headed off to pick up my luggage, find the car and head back to the farm.

It’s good to be home.