Back to Reality

Well here we sit in Calgary airport and our adventure back to reality started yesterday. Actually yesterday morning we were sitting in the hot tub at Villa Case du Roy after a morning coffee. We were enjoying the warmth of the sun and the quietness of the day prior to a hectic day of travel. Well we finally had to return the “Le Voiture Malade” and check in with WinAir. After a bit of a wait we boarded the Twin Otter for the 15 minute flight back to St. Maarten; take off was standard and toward the ocean. At St. Maarten we had about a 3 hr wait prior to boarding our plane back to the USA. Actually we boarded a bus then got driven out to our plane across the tarmac. Someone in the airport told us it is the busiest week of the year at the airport as it is the end Presidents Day Weekend, so lots of USA tourists. Everything looked like it was going to be on schedule and then we had to wait a couple minutes for a maintenance approval and then jsut when we started to get puchedback the “tug” quit working, so there we sat stranded. We finally got in the air about 1 hr behind schedule. We arrived into Washington D.C. Dulles International at 8:25 p.m. to the center terminal. Normally they close Customs/Immigration at 8:30 p.m.; however they kept it open so we didn’t have to spend the next hour taking buses and shuttles between terminals just to clear Customs, etc. After a short wait we were off to Denver CO. everything was smooth and we arrived about 25 minutes ahead of schedule. Unfortunately Denver Airport is out in the middle of nowhere, so after a 15 minute walk and train ride through the airport and another 15 minute shuttle ride we got to our hotel and to bed just before 1:00 a.m. EST. Well 6:00 a.m. wake up call came early and we were back to Denver to repeat the process this time thought there were literally thousands of other travellers and the line ups were unbelievable. We finally got to our gate on our plane and after a relatively smooth flight we landed in Calgary. It was a real treat to get to an Airport that wasn’t so busy and jammed with people. We were lucky enough to have a quick lunch with Jeff (Lindsay was working). Anyway, off to catch the final leg of our flights to get home.