The Airport Shuffle

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Okay, I know it's been several months since the honeymoon, but it's been slow going on the travel blog front. Bear with me! And without further ado...

Our honeymoon officially started at two minutes past midnight on Oct 5, 2009. Absolutely exhausted from the wedding, we were asleep in the hotel near the Colorado Springs airport, our dreams filled with crashing waves, sandy beaches and the occasional hula girl (that must have been Kevin's dream?) ... when my cell phone rang. I tore myself out of sleep and stumbled across the room just in time for it to stop. I looked at the call history and saw a 1-800 number. I realized it must have been the airline calling with a flight update... they had probably moved our flight by 6 minutes or something. I went back to bed and was just falling asleep when the phone rang again. This time I leaped out of bed in a fury, wondering what can possibly be so important?!? "This is United Airlines calling with a flight update. Your flight has been affected by a cancellation. Your flight has been re-booked for... tomorrow... October 6." TOMORROW?? We had a beach-front cottage waiting for us, already paid for... tomorrow would just not do.

So, here we were, on the phone at midnight, trying to get our flight rescheduled. We succeeded, and showed up (a little dreary-eyed) at the airport for our 6:30 am flight. When we got to the counter, we were told that the flight we were re-booked on was departing late, so they re-booked us on another airline. We got to THAT counter and were told that flight was also departing late so we couldn't take that one either. We shuffled back over to United, where we saw a bright-eyed couple sporting Hawaiian shirts. We looked knowingly at each other and Kevin said "I bet that guy thinks he's going to Maui." The man swiped his card in the machine and cocked his head in confusion as the screen blinked spitefully at him -- "FLIGHT CANCELLATION". (Apparently he didn't have his cell phone on at midnight.)

We finally got re-booked again, and made it to the gate. Every 20 minutes, my phone would ring with another flight update... delayed... delayed... we waited about an hour and a half until they finally started forming a line to re-book everyone again. Eventually, we were put in a cab with two other people and sent off to Denver to catch a flight there.

We arrived in Maui about 6 hours late, and I had about 13 more messages on my phone about the original flight being delayed. We were staying in Hana on the west side of the island, and the only way to get there is a 2 hour drive filled with countless one-lane bridges and blind hairpin turns. We had wanted to arrive during the daylight for this very reason, but found ourselves driving in the dark... Kevin getting disoriented because every single white concrete bridge and every single hairpin turn looked the same. I struggled to stay awake so that I could periodically cover my eyes and scream "OhmyGodSlowDOWN!!" (As any good wife would do.)

One such time, I saw a giant figure moving at the side of the road. "OhmyGodSlowDOWN! Watch out for that....

cow?

A wild cow. Who knew there was such a thing? Calmly grazing at the side of the road in the middle of the night, all by himself. And that's when I knew... we were finally in Hawaii.

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Comments

[Marta]

Airport Shuffle
WOW what an adventure you had just to get there.