Travel-Day One

The morning started early and in my usual rushed fashion. As noted in the last post, the boys quickly had everything loaded in the car and off we went to the airport. That was the only quick and easy part of the day. To say it was a long day would be an understatement.


We flew a flight plan that nearly EVERY other adopting family flies to Ethiopia. Fly to D.C., stay overnight, fly out the next morning to Ethiopia. I also happen to know that EVERY other adopting family that has flown this has had no problems with the connecting airline not checking their baggage through to the next day flight on Ethiopian. Every other family, but us. I won 't say the name of the airline..but it starts with a U and rhymes with delighted, which it was NOT! The check-in lady was not rude, but never attempted to be even slightly helpful. She refused to check our baggage through, which meant we had to pick up ALL 8 pieces of luggage in D.C., take them to the hotel and then back to the airport the next morning. Counting our carry-ons that meant we three were wrestling with 14 bags in D.C., on of which was a wet cardboard box, but you'll hear more on that in a bit.

So we get all of our baggage finally checked with U***** and still have some leisure time before we had to board, which meant we HAD to find a Starbucks. Now I was a "bit" frazzled at this point and definitely needed some calm down time before getting on a plane.


We flew to Chicago, made it to our gate, only for a hail storm to hit minutes before we were supposed to board. Needless to say, that didn't happen on time. I think we were VERY lucky that we were already in Chicago when the storm hit, because one of our other adopting families was now and they missed their flights on Ethiopian because of it. As we sit and wait to board, we see our luggage being loaded. I say a quick prayer as I see our cardboard box containing a rocking chair get close to the airplane door as it looked like it wasn't going to fit. Did I mention that it was still raining and all of our luggage was getting wet? Hence the wet cardboard in D.C.



An hour and a half later (most of that sitting on the runway) we finally take off to D.C. Then the fun started! We walk up to the baggage claim and the first thing we see is one of the donation duffles in a very large plastic bag with it's contents spewn everywhere. Luckily, the zipper wasn't broken, it must have just popped open, but that was a SCARY sight. Thoughts of duct tape were definitely involved. After we finally get the baggage together and delicately place our wet, falling apart box (the feet of the rocker were pointing out of the corners) on top of it all we went outside to find our hotel shuttle that was supposed to be waiting.

I immediately see the shuttle start to run up to the driver to tell him we need on, but he turns away, says something about another one coming soon, and drives off. 45 minutes later we decided to call the hotel. Once we got to the hotel they were AWESOME!! They let us keep our cart of luggage downstairs in the lobby so we didn't have to drag it up and then back downstairs. The little restaurant stayed open later so we could eat dinner and we all felt a little better after getting some rest.

Thus ends day one. Travel day two to come!


-amory