Back to the States

After a restless night on an uncomfortable airport chair, I awoke around 4:30 am to hoards of Englishmen pouring into the airport. “Do not bring your luggage on this escalator” repeated every 5-10 seconds. We had no choice but to wake up.

We cleaned up in the bathroom and grabbed some breakfast at a cafeteria-style café upstairs. The cashier girl called me “Love”. It made me smile.

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After killing a couple hours at the café, we checked in for our flight. As we were checking in, the lady behind the counter informed us that a new “departure tax” had been enacted since we purchased our tickets. The tax would be 40 pounds per person. That equates to over 150 US dollars. Yikes!

Our flight departed Manchester at 11:00 am local time and would arrive in Chicago around noon local time. It is going to be a long day.

On the flight we were served two lunches. The first consisted of a salad, cheese and crackers, bread, entrée (chicken, peas, and potatoes), small candy bar, and ice cream. All the portions were very small, but there were so many courses! The second lunch consisted of a sandwich. All the food was quite good.

There were several TV, movie, and game options on the flight. Each seat is equipped with a small screen and a remote/game controller. I played some Super Mario Brothers, then watched Cool Hand Luke. That is a great movie. They just don’t make movies like that anymore. Darcy watched Sponge Bob Square Pants.

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I didn’t sleep the entire flight. Darcy slept about 2-3 hours.

In Chicago, we had to pick up our luggage, go through passport control, then go through customs. I was a bit worried going through customs that we would have to answer a bunch of questions about what was in our luggage. I didn’t want them to take away my wine. We were hardly asked any questions and passed right through.

Next, we had to recheck our bags for the connecting flight to Minneapolis, then go to a different terminal and go through security again in order to get to our gate. At the security checkpoint, my bag was searched because I had chocolates filled with liquid. Luckily, they didn’t confiscate them.

While waiting at the gate for our flight, an announcement was made that they were looking for people to bump to a later flight. The compensation would be a free roundtrip ticket anywhere United flies in the continental US. The bump would be to a flight that leaves an hour later. It was a no-brainer, so now we have two free tickets.

Our flight to Minneapolis was staffed by some weird cabin attendants. One of the announcements over the loudspeaker was as follows:

“Would Hazel Nut and D. Calf please report to their seats? Hazel Nut and D. Calf please report to your seats.”

It was so lame. No one on the plane laughed.

On the flight I was sandwiched between two business types. One played on his SmartPhone, then laptop, then read The Economist. The other tapped away on his PDA with his stylus, then had a Chardonnay, then read Forbes magazine. I didn’t check, but I’m sure they were cyborgs (Tip: The Bluetooth device clipped to the ear gives it away. Please kill me if I ever don one).

We arrived in Minneapolis around 5:00 pm local time. The total time that had passed since we arrived to the airport in Amsterdam is about 30 hours.

After collecting our baggage, we took the train and bus back to Uptown. On the bus, I saw a guy with a hat that had the text “Sortie” on the back. “Sortie” means “Exit” in French. In France, we got used to seeing this in metro stops and train stations. I think his hat had something to do with the Paris metro system. Anyway, I found it ironic.

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Once in Uptown, we walked back to our condo. Everything looks and feels really strange, especially inside our condo. After hopping from city to city and living out of a backpack for a month, it feels strange to have so much space of our own. I’ve always thought that our 600 square feet of living space is small, but right now it feels humongous.

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We spent the rest of the evening unpacking and talking to friends and family. It turns out that the blog and photos have been a big hit. Now, we don’t have to bore people with the details of our trip. Those that care already know everything.

Surprisingly, we stayed up until 10:00 pm. That is equivalent to 5:00 am in Europe. When I finally did go to bed, I fell asleep within seconds.

Tomorrow is Thursday and we don’t have to be back to work until Monday. So that gives us several days to decompress and numb our brains back into the routine. Then, it is back to the rat race.

Click here to see all our Manchester II photos.

Click here to see all our photo sets.