We Made It – Yahoo!

Well, it was interesting …… that’s the best way to describe the last couple of days. If this had been a worked related trip in my former life (working days) I’m sure we exceeded a least a couple regulatory requirements along the way.  However, that’s all behind us now and we are comfortably located in St. Maarten at the Turquoise Shell Inn. So what happened? Well we left Kamloops close to the departure time and arrived into Vancouver pretty well on schedule. Customs and Immigration was smooth and the new system for baggage handling is pretty slick. If you are transferring on to a USA bound flight you no longer have to pick up your luggage; what happens is they take a picture and you identify it with the security people and the customs officer on their computer screen. The United Airlines flight out of Vancouver was a little late  but we were late getting into Chicago due to weather and air traffic. When we taxied and arrived at the gate the pilot shut off all the power systems prior to the ground crew hooking up power so there we were in the dark until the emergency lighting came on…… never had that happen before. The gate to our next flight was only steps away and everything was lining up for a quick connection. That was until the airplane developed a mechanical issue just after we boarded and were getting ready to get pushed back for taxi and take-off. So after a few minutes the pilot decided to abandon this flight and he had us all go to another gate where a flight that had been delayed earlier was waiting for us. In the end we were about 1 1/2 hrs behind schedule and finally got to the hotel and to bed a about 2:00 a.m. local time. The 6:30 a.m. wake up call came early and we were off to the airport, the flight left on time and arrived a few minutes early…… things are looking good! OOPS that was a little premature. As we exited the airplane and head to customs the lights in the airport go out…….. I mean pitch black except for the very rare battery powered building light and of course cellphones, cameras, the odd flashlight and my I-Pod screen. So, that means that absolutely no one could enter St. Maarten or depart on a flight from St. Maarten. The good news is that we were the first aircraft in at that time and of course in the front of the Customs line. Pity the poor people that were the 4th aircraft in that afternoon. So there we were (and of course 600 other people) waiting for the lights to come on. Well things on the Caribbean Islands move at a little slower pace than where we live. But after a little over 1 hour the lights came on, people cheered and everyone was hustled through the line-ups. In another post I’ll rant about people’s etiquette, politeness, beautiful people syndrome (those that think they look so good and should get to go to the front of the line, etc). Anyway, we finally made to St. Maarten and I hope to attach pictures from Simpson Bay Beach if I can get a solid internet connectiion. More to come…… check regularly.