OFF TO ANTARCTICA!

December 26 2012

Departure day!  Our flights started off pretty rocky.  There was a big winter storm approaching and by Christmas night we knew there was a slim to none hope of getting out.  So we made lots of calls. And asked Karen if she would be willing to go to boyfriend Alex’s house in MA a day earlier than planned, via JFK so that we wouldn’t have to chance the commuter flights.  It felt wrong to suddenly abandon Janet and Adam who were still at our house, visiting from Seattle, but it was the right thing to do.

About an hour down the road, I checked my phone and the State College flight had, indeed, been canceled.

About 20 minutes from JFK we got a phone call that the flight to Chile, scheduled to depart at 10:45 that we were on, as well as one that left at 8 pm, were delayed twelve hours.  We stood in line with LOTS of other travelers for 2 ½ hours waiting to the airline to get customer service people in, but they never showed up.  Around 5, I called LAN and switched our seats to the earlier (though still delayed) flight.  About 5:30 I called LAN again to see when there would be people at JFK to help us.

I was told the weather was not their responsibility, so they were not going to send anyone over until 5 in the morning.  They had no signs posted, there was not an arrival and departure board anywhere in site.  Thank goodness my travel agent had called to tell us, or we might still be standing there.

We got a Holiday Inn Express hotel room near the airport (hauling luggage through the airport and on a train, and then waiting a loooong time for the promised shuttle bus, while helping some older-than-us travelers get their stuff where they were going), and about the time we unlocked the door, I had a phone call from Karen.  In 2 ½ hours, she had managed to drive 35 miles – first in a huge traffic jam out of New York, then on ice, rain, snow, etc. that slowed traffic to 5-10mph.  She was calling to say that she had quit and was headed to the nearest hotel, in glorious Armonk, NY.  Meanwhile, we called in delivery dinner (Italian), which was edible although rather on the slow side. 

December 27, 2012

Well, after another 2-hour wait at the airport (looooong line and minimal guidance from LAN), we finally got our luggage checked and were at the gate.  By now we had friends that we had stood in so many lines with.  None of them were Cheeseman people (that’s the name of the company running our tour), but we had fun chatting with them.  Many were headed to a cruise in the other direction – off to Easter Island – my mother would be jealous – that’s a place she always wanted to visit.

The flight to Chile was fairly uneventful.  But at the airport, we had no luggage.  It took a long time to figure out where the LAN desk was hidden in a far corner of the airport, and then another long time to find someone who with their little bit of English and Rick’s little bit of Spanish, could understand our problem.  When she did, she disappeared for awhile, and reappeared with all our luggage!  My only guess is they took it for an additional inspection, but I don’t know.  Others had the same problem.  We were able to figure out how to find our prepaid transportation to the hotel, and got to our hotel room about 11pm, ordered a piece of cheesecake from room service (which took an hour to arrive) and fell into bed.