Twisted Tales of Travel

This entry will not take on the usual style of a story about a trip or time with friends and family including pictures. The reason for this stems from the crazy travels taken during the past couple of weeks. I left for Washington D.C. at the beginning of April to attend my cousin’s wedding as well as spend some extra time with family followed by a few days taking in the sights of New York City with a friend from Texas. During that time, the volcano in Iceland erupted causing havoc with flights in and out of Europe. Needless to say, my flight joined the ranks of others showing “cancelled” on the airline monitors. After over 2 hours on the phone from my hotel room in NYC and hearing that the airline could not get me back to Brussels for a week and a half, I snagged a seat on a flight going to Dallas where I stayed with my twin brother and his family. My mom also happened to be there, so this made for a fun diversion from the pain of not making it home. I made numerous calls over the following days to the airline in hopes of finding an open seat to Brussels. They managed to move me from a Wednesday flight to a Tuesday flight to a Sunday flight and finally a Saturday flight. Thrilled at the prospect of finally getting home and seeing Ken for a few hours before his train to London, I packed my bags, headed to the airport, and checked in for my flight. When the departure time of my flight kept moving to a later time, I realized that I could never make the connection to my international flight. So, I went to the airline counter and explained my dilemma. The agent could not get me onto any flight that day to Brussels, so she sent me to another airline. After realizing that the flight they suggested would not allow me any time with Ken (and I already desperately missed him), I made the decision to take a flight to London instead and just meet Ken there. The gate agent assured me that my luggage would receive a new tag with London as the destination, so I happily boarded the plane and, upon arrival, felt like kissing the ground. That joy quickly subsided when I discovered that my bag went to Madrid instead of London. The attendant felt certain that the suitcase would find its way to Brussels, and once there, an agent would make sure that the bag was placed on a flight to London. I held my breath for the next 24 hours as I awaited the arrival of all of my clothes, make-up, and goodies from the US. Thankfully, my suitcase and I were finally reunited. I still haven’t made it back to Brussels, but when I do next week, I will post some photos with the fun activities from the past several weeks.