Day 21 - Atlanta to Anaheim

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Well the day started pretty much the same as yesterday. Opened the blinds to see a pile of snow in the courtyard. After breakfast Kerry & I went and had a look outside to see how things looked. A couple of the hotel workers were trying to shovel snow from the driveway to make access better. The roads were still a mess and sidewalks pretty slippery too.

I decided that since the MARTA train station was only 50 metres away (just across the road) we should try and catch the train to the CBD which is 5 stops away as we were pretty sure they would have this area cleaned up by now.

I first checked on the Internet to find out that the World of Coca-Cola Museum was not opened, then I found out the Georgia Acquarium was also closed. Website said nothing about CNN but when I called them to check I got the bad news for this attraction too.

The next few hours drifted along with me getting my blogs up to date and watching the weather channel. I noticed we were starting to get some stories about flooding back home which made us all think how trivial it was to lose a day or two stuck in our room.

Kerry & I had both started questioning why we had stayed in Atlanta when we knew the storm was arriving. It was always our plan to change the itinerary if we needed to avoid bad weather but neither of us ever expected a city to be shut down for what was already 48 hours ( no-one had even started clearing roads or sidewalks etc). The schools were still closed and unlikely to be opening this week.

The news coming out of the airport was most flights had been cancelled, and I was starting to think about whether we would be able to fly out tomorrow as planned. It seemed to be that the odd flight or two was arriving and leaving, and the forecast was for ongoing cold weather until the weekend. Temperature today peaked at about 1-2 degrees as we started seeing some snow melting drop by drop from the gutters on the roof.

I started wondering if the NBA game was going to be on tonight. I had bought Luke tickets for XMAS and we had good seats. I checked the website and confirmed the game was still on and Milwaukee Bucks had arrived in town. We were basically just killing time for the day until around 5PM when I had planned to head off to the game.

At about 4.55PM I was checking online and saw a headline saying the game had been postponed. Great ! I checked a couple of other sources to verify, and before long I got an email from Ticketmaster saying the game had been rescheduled to March.

One of things that I had been doing to pass the time was checking the flight schedules coming and going from the airport.

I had noticed a trend that all Delta flights that were going direct to LAX had started leaving from around 3PM. I said to Kerry do you want to get the hell outta here ? Another website explained how the airport was full of bodies sleeping around who had missed their flights (what to do ?). Part of the problem was that the overnight temperatures were freezing so it took quite a few hours to get the runways clear before flights could resume. Our scheduled flight tomorrow was at 11.10AM and I was really worried it would be cancelled and we’d be stuck in Atlanta longer.

After some deliberation we agreed to give it a try. I checked to see if I could book flights on a flight tonight ad there was availability on the 9.55PM flight. I called Delta up to try and see if they could change it and they did it on the phone.

We quickly packed everything up and our first dilemna was taking 7 suitcases, 2 backpacks and the 2 PC bags across a frozen road to get to the train station which had direct access to the airport. We had one porter give us a hand but as I checked out they said good luck as if the flight did not leave they would have someone else use my room. You wouldn’t believe it but as we left the front of the hotel we finally saw some graders start clearing the roads.

Anyway we got to the airport and the flight was still on track, checked the bags in and still on track. At about 9PM I decided to start arranging somewhere to stay in LA. First call was to try and get early access to our room in Anaheim. I called and asked if we could check in early. She said check in time was normally 4PM and asked what time I was arriving. I said about 1 o’clock and she said it would be OK. I said 1AM and she went quiet. After agreeing to pay another nights accommodation we were done. I then arranged transport with the same people we used when we arrived at LAX at the start of our trip. 10.30PM we finally took off. What a relief to be airborne.

Flight was pretty uneventful (which was good). Delta at least have the TV screens and had satellite TV as well. We arrived in LAX after 5 hours in the air, got our luggage which was saturated (yuck !). Kerry wondered if it had fallen off a luggage cart in Atlanta on to the snow for a while. Anyway got out the front and where was out driver. No-where was the answer. 4-5 calls and 30 minutes later still not there.

After some badgering from the missus (it was after all now after 1AM local time or 4M Atlanta time) I agreed to let the Supershuttle guys take us. It was amazing to see how busy this place was at 1AM on a Wednesday morning. We had this angry driver who keep honing his horn every moment he had a chance. We were the last drop off (don’t you hate that ?), and Kerry reckoned I should have given him a road map instead of a tip as we were gong South bound to San Diego (past Long Beach), then North Bound to LA (past Long Beach again), then back South bound to San Diego (I recall passing by Long Beach a 3rd time !).

We finally arrived at the Camelot Inn & Suites and did the late check in as fast as we could and we were in the room by about 3AM local time and bedtime ! (that is 6AM Atlanta time). Wow what a day that was.

The good news is that we are now out of the cold. LA is forecast to be sunny and 20 degrees tomorrow. Yippee !

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