Monday morning we got up and packed for our trip home.
It was hard to believe that I would be back in the cold in less than 12 hours. The good thing was it was already March 4. How much longer could winter last. Lindsey and Heber walked down to our hotel to say goodbye. When we got in the car to leave I realized we had just hugged our safety net goodbye. No more translator. No more help with directions. No one to read road signs. The last one didn't matter because there are no road signs. Being submersed in the Nica culture for a week taught us a hablar just enough espaniol to get nosotros en problemas. We left early enough so if there were problems we could still make our flight. This time everything went perfect. We didn't get stopped by police, there weren't any horses or cattle in the road and there were very few rough patches of road. We arrived at the airport with plenty of time to return the rental car, get a bite to eat , check in and do a little duty free shopping. Check in seemed to be taking longer than normal and the woman behind the counter seem to be getting alittle anxious. We were suppose to fly out of managua to Houston. Lay over for 2 hours and then fly to Ohare. Unfortunately our flight from Houston to Ohare had been canceled. She managed to book us on another flight but there was one problem. The lay over was only 50 minutes. 50 minutes to pick up our luggage, get through customs and take the tram to another terminal. I could see the wheels turning in Becky's head.
Then, when we found out there was a blizzard heading for Chicago tonight , we knew if we missed this flight we might be waiting for a long time. The trip to Houston went well and we arrived on time. The airline magazine on the plane had a map of the Houston airport and we were able to map out our exit strategy. So when we hit the ground we rushed down to baggage claim.....and waited for the carousel to start. We grabbed our luggage and rushed over to customs....and waited in line. Long line. The wheels in Becs head were on the verge of panic mode. It seemed like everyone in front of us left some change in there pockets or forgot to remove their belt or shoes or had a hip replacement or a metal plate in their head. I don't know what was going on but it seemed like it took forever and when we got through... The race was on. We ran to the tram and when we got off we ran to our gate.
We got there with 20 min. to spare but no one else was there. There was one guy sitting near the gate. He said he heard the flight was canceled and he thought everyone went to customer service.
Well, it was a nice try. Customer service was close by so we went there and told them we had boarding passes for the flight that had been canceled. "Canceled? That flight wasn't canceled. They just changed it from gate 22 to gate 44. If you hurry you can still make it. " 22 gates is along way to run through an airport. Luckily one of the airport employees with a cart saw us running and picked us up and drove us down the hall way to gate 44. We made it. But the plane was suppose to leave in 7 minutes. Shouldn't everyone be boarded by now. Every chair in the area was full. Then we look at the sign behind the boarding desk.
FLIGHT DELAYED 1 HOUR
What a relief. We didn't miss it. But all that running for nothing.
I slept most of the way from Houston to Ohare. We beat the snow storm and had a nice drive home too. It did however snow so much that night , I couldn't go to work the next day. Everything always seems to work out very well in the end.
A snow day.......What a great way to end a vacation.
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