Day 5: Behind the wall
(1/21) -- First off, I should mention I finally remembered to get Chad something -- and that was chocolates from the hotel bakery. (I'm not that mean a brother.)
3:00 am came awfully early, but I was greeted by English-language pop music thanks to Universal 88.1, where only the commercials are in Spanish. And while the second song was that '80s classic "The Never-Ending Story," I had to get moving.
While checking out, I also arranged with the desk clerk for a car ride to the airport. Along with the dinner, the 400-peso ride was the high-price item on the bill. Compared to the crawls I took in the Uber and the tour bus, the 4am ride to the airport was supersonic.
Standing in line to check in, I was amazed at the number of people who were up at this hour -- still up? -- flying off to everywhere. I did have to work with the American Airlines desk agent to explain that Charleston and Charlotte are different places. (She was giving each city the hard "ch".)
Technology has no doubt improved the international flight. My 6am plane to Dallas had a iPod-like media center which offered up hundreds of CDs in multiple genres. Given the time, I pulled up several soft-rock albums to listen to while reading my book, though I switched to Bon Jovi on the descent.
Not to get too political, but I was glad that I cleared the border with little problem after what happened yesterday. There wasn't much off a rush, as even after re-checking through security, I still had over an hour for my Charlotte-bound flight.
Once in Charlotte, I noticed via my FlightAware app that the home-bound flight would be pushed back even farther, so the scheduled three-hour wait would be even longer. So I had lunch -- where I greeted a fellow Steelers fan; waving my napkin like a Terrible Towel, he at first took offense -- and watched the DVD of Frida at the gate.
Finally, I was able to jump the puddle and get home.
3:00 am came awfully early, but I was greeted by English-language pop music thanks to Universal 88.1, where only the commercials are in Spanish. And while the second song was that '80s classic "The Never-Ending Story," I had to get moving.
While checking out, I also arranged with the desk clerk for a car ride to the airport. Along with the dinner, the 400-peso ride was the high-price item on the bill. Compared to the crawls I took in the Uber and the tour bus, the 4am ride to the airport was supersonic.
Standing in line to check in, I was amazed at the number of people who were up at this hour -- still up? -- flying off to everywhere. I did have to work with the American Airlines desk agent to explain that Charleston and Charlotte are different places. (She was giving each city the hard "ch".)
Technology has no doubt improved the international flight. My 6am plane to Dallas had a iPod-like media center which offered up hundreds of CDs in multiple genres. Given the time, I pulled up several soft-rock albums to listen to while reading my book, though I switched to Bon Jovi on the descent.
Not to get too political, but I was glad that I cleared the border with little problem after what happened yesterday. There wasn't much off a rush, as even after re-checking through security, I still had over an hour for my Charlotte-bound flight.
Once in Charlotte, I noticed via my FlightAware app that the home-bound flight would be pushed back even farther, so the scheduled three-hour wait would be even longer. So I had lunch -- where I greeted a fellow Steelers fan; waving my napkin like a Terrible Towel, he at first took offense -- and watched the DVD of Frida at the gate.
Finally, I was able to jump the puddle and get home.