All Stressed Out From Travel Planning

Traveling by air isn’t what it used to be. There was a time when it was easy to just pick a flight and take a bag with the bare essentials ...  a camera, film, clothes and toiletries.    However, electronics has changed how I travel.  Perhaps, you could say I wasn't addicted to electronics in the past.  At least not as much as today even though I did have a Sony Vaio Picturebook laptop.  Anyone remember those?  At just over 2 pounds with a huge 12GB hard drive and a long-life 5 1/2 hour battery it was before it's time ... kind of like a tablet.   It was a great little machine for storing digital pictures on the road. 

With three trips on the horizon within the next two weeks, I've been stressing with the flights.   Sunday I started looking for cords, chargers and other necessary gadgets.  My laptop wasn’t going but my tablet was.  The difference with a tablet is I needed to pack gadgets to make other gadgets functional.  So, into a bag went the charger, bluetooth keyboard and mouse.  Since it only had one mini-USB connector, I needed a converter and a 4port hub.  Then, I threw in a thumb drive plus an AC charger. Since the flights were long I figured I better also put in a  DC to AC plug.  I wasn't done though.   Next I tracked down batteries, SD cards, my camera and iPhone charger.   By the time I finished I had two little Ziplock bags filled with miscellaneous paraphernalia.  I couldn't take everything and figured I probably wouldn't use much of this stuff either.  My goal on the first trip was to travel with one backpack only.

The worst part of the planning was making sure I could get to the desired destination when I needed to be there. I could have actually bought tickets but buying three sets of tickets within a two week period was actually not what I wanted to do.  Since I knew I didn't have to .... I didn’t.  The chore was finding flights that I’d be able to travel standby on without worrying too much about not making a flight. Obviously,  I needed a little creativity in my travel plans. This was the plan from Las Vegas to Portland and the return but with all plans I'm good at writing this stuff in chalk and erasing if it doesn't work out.  

A change of clothes, cosmetics, electronics and the added snacks for in flight travel, were soon stuffed in the backpack.  My first flight is scheduled to leave Las Vegas on Tuesday and arrive in Portland nine hours later.  I know . .. I know.  It’s not that far.  Well, it is if you have to travel to Dallas, Texas first!!  That’s what I have to do both going and coming.  Arrival time in Portland will be close to midnight allowing the next day for Sandi’s National Honor Society initiation with a before dawn return flight the following morning.   It sure would be nice to be able to stay a little longer but that's impossible.

It will be back to Vegas for one day to do laundry, secure the coach and get Duchess settled in with cousin, Shelley before we rush off for another flight the following day.  Destination --  Norfolk, Virginia. Yes, that's right ... Justin's ship will be arriving back from Syria's coastline.

Going

Returning

The flight we hope to take leaves just before midnight and arrives about 12 hours later.   That’s certainly a long time for that distance but again we aren't going direct.  We're going by way of Miami. The return flight isn't quite so scenic.  Thank goodness.

Do you think our grandkids realize all the effort and stress that goes into these trips?  I'm betting not but I can guarantee you that they will always remember that we were there.

We get a break before the next flight which is over Thanksgiving and back to Portland.  Some of that time will probably be spent doing catch up from all the lack of sleep the next few days will bring.

---------------------

After I wrote this blog and just before posting I decided to make one more change.  I may agree to the return flight from Portland to Dallas to Las Vegas but I really didn't want that same itinerary on my way there.  I was tired just thinking about it.  Thus ... this is what I decided to do instead.  I changed the plan.

Going

Returning

Could you keep up with this?  Those flights aren't actually so unusual for us.  We've been known to go west from Dallas to catch a flight from Los Angeles to head east to London just to get good seats  .....  I bet you’re thankful you don’t travel with us. 

‘Tis life on the road … or, is it the air?

When all's said and done, all roads lead to the same end.
So it's not so much which road you take,as how you take it.