Day 13 - My Cross Country Adventure Ends...

I started writing this at  7:36 AM in the Atlanta airport

 

I had no problem getting through security and had about 90 minutes till departure.  I
enjoyed that extra hour of sleep today due to the return to standard
time.  (You remembered right?)

It's was beautiful day in Atlanta.  The shuttle to the airport was
waiting for me as I got off the elevator at the hotel...the Airport
Crowne-Plaza.  There was no waiting to check-in...short lines at security.

I had a great time  in Atlanta but it was very nice to get home. 
It was a direct flight to Albany and we landed right around 11:30 AM.

 

It's been a windy weekend here in the Northeast and our flight was a little

bumpy the last few minutes but not too bad at all.

 

My bag was half way open on the luggage carousel and a carrying strap from another bag was hanging out of it but I don't think anything was missing.

 

I do think I left my old digital camera in the rental car in TX and I have a call in to the

Lost and Found there.  Not a big deal really.  I'd downloaded most of the pictures I took and it was 4 or 5 years old anyway.

 

I last recall having it in Texas because 9 of the 10 kids did a rendition of that Sound of

Music scene where the kids are singing goodnight/goodbye to the dinner guests...and

I recorded it with the camera.

 

Other than losing the camera it was a GREAT trip.

 

I had 8 flights...6 trips thorough airport security...spent time in 5 cities...three hotels and three car rentals. 

 

I had absolutely no problems with any of it.  My luggage arrived at the same time I did, all six times...the hotel rooms were clean and comfortable. The planes left and arrived, for the most part right on time.  There were no weather delays.  The hotels had washers and dryers so I could wear clean clothes. 

 

I made some great contacts, spent time with some relatives and  renewed some old friendships.  In this day and age it could have been a much more frustrating trip.

 

I'm grateful that it wasn't

 

In my weekly newsletter I'll include a short video with the item I carried with me

that I think smoothed the way for me on this trip.  It'll put a smile on your face and

you'll want to run right out and get one for yourself.

 

Thanks for following along and for your comments.

Have a great day!

Leo

Day 11 - My Cross Country Adventure...

Since I last checked in I've flown from Salt Lake City through Denver on
my way to Dallas.

This was one day before Denver got walloped with snow. PHEW!

While in Dallas I stayed with my friends Dan and Kelley AND their
10...TEN...children. And you are complaining about how many kids? ;)
They are great! Verywell behaved and respectful.

I was only on the ground in Dallas for about 28 hours and then it was a
1 hour and 40 minute flight to Atlanta, GA on American Airlines...my fourth airline
company on this trip.

I've had great experiences on all the airlines.

I'm not renting a car here in Atlanta so I had to find my way to the
hotel shuttles. This is a huge and busy airport and I made a wrong turn or two but
eventually found the place I needed.

I can see the flight path of the airport from my hotel room
and right now I can see 8 planes in line to land at 10:42PM.

It was a rainy day in Atlanta but it didn't effect me since the seminar
I'm attending went all day.

It's been a great trip but I am very looking forward to getting home and
implementing all I've learned and working with the interesting people I've met....and
sleeping in my own bed will be a nice added benefit.

I'll make one more entry related to this trip once I'm home. I'm due
in Sunday morning.

Thanks for reading and thanks for your best wishes.

Leo

Day 8 - My Cross Country Adventure...

Just like that and a week is gone.

It went fast.

It's been a beautiful stay here in UT. I brought Indian summer with me and they were very appreciative.

Today after the conclusion of the conference I was attending, there was still about 90 minutes of daylight so I checked out the travel brochures in the hotel lobby.

I discovered Park City, UT (site of the 2002 Olympics and The Sundance Film Festival) was only about 40 miles away.

I punched the address into the GPS and off I went. I'm not one to get too excited about scenery but the area around here is very beautiful. No snow around here yet, but it's on the way I'm sure.

The winding mountain roads looked on the newer side but they were not roads I'd want to be on during a snow storm.

By the time I arrived in Park City, the Rolex store was closed. Oh well, guess I'll have to get a Rolex on my next trip.

You can get a sense of the type of shops you'll find in this town by virtue of the fact they even HAVE a Rolex store. It was probably just a regular jewelry store but word ROLEX on the awning dwarfed the name of the place.

Tomorrow I'm off to Dallas, TX through Denver on Frontier Airlines. It's a total of only 3 hours flying in 4 hours so I won't get much TV watching in on this trip.

Utah has been great.

I highly recommend you visit.

Thanks for reading!

Leo

Day 6 - My Cross Country Adventure...

I started this day in Hollister, CA. Several of the cousins live down that way and it was nice to see them all. Saturday it was 88 degrees and I was sweating!

I'm not sure if this city is what inspired the clothing line all the kids wear these days.

I arrived at the San Jose airport about 1 hour before my 1:30 flight. I checked my bags at the curb, which I've never done before. (They made it.) I asked the guy to weigh my bag
to make sure it wasn't overweight.

He curled it like a barbell and said it was OK. Good enough for me!

There was a bit of a line at the security check point but I got right through. My flight was leaving from gate C-9 and once you got through security there was NOTHING else to do but wait. No bathrooms...no shops...just two small waiting areas for two gates and they were jammed.

This was a flight on Delta. I can't recall ever flying them before. They have most everything automated, right down to calling the rows they were boarding.

Even the safety presentation was on video.

The flight was good and uneventful. My seat mates weren't very talkative..not English anyway. I did notice wood flooring in the bathroom! Fancy. We arrived right on time to sunny Salt Lake City, UT.

Utah is beautiful....the surrounding mountains remind me of Las Vegas.

I'm staying in Sandy, UT and it's a very new looking place. My GPS gets me around nicely
and without any problem. I found out where the conference is tomorrow so I'm all set.

I was happy to discover a washer and dryer in the hotel and I used it. They also have an indoor pool which I'll probably skip this trip.

I asked the gal at the front desk if this was a unusually nice day for UT and she said it's usually colder and snowing by now.

Apparently I bring the nice weather with me. Happy to do it.

I'm here till Wednesday morning and then it's on to Dallas, TX through Denver.

Have a great week!

Leo

Day 3- My Cross Country Adventure...

It's 12 midnight in San Jose CA as I write this...so 3AM where I came from.

I left my conference in Baltimore around 3:15PM. I set the GPS for
Reagan International Airport and after missing a turn or two due to
heavy traffic I finally got to the airport around 5...one hour before my
6PM departure.

I'd been to BWI 4 or 5 times this year but this was my first trip out of
Reagan so it wasn't as familiar to me. I felt a little rushed handing
the car back in and getting on the shuttle for the terminal...since I
didn't know what the line situation would be.

No waiting at the Frontier Airlines counter...my bag was the exact same
weight as when I weighed it in Albany....so I haven't accumulated too
much junk yet.

Next it was getting through security. I walked all the way down to the
WRONG gate....it was the gate for my connection in Denver....so back
down the long corridor I go. No lines at security and I got right
through....and once again walked right onto the plane!! Me thinks I'm
cutting it way too close...two for two.

I chose Frontier Airlines for two reasons...newer planes and 24 channels
of Direct TV in the seats. I'd flown them once before a few years ago
from Vegas and was very happy with them. Well, my bag was a few hours
late but I can forgive a lot when there is TV involved.

I had a middle seat on this 3 hour and 40 minute flight. Turned out it
wasn't so bad. Neither of my seat mates were very talkative...one was
reading a book by former Notre Dame Football coach Lou Holtz and the
other, some sort of riveting document called "Linking Housing Growth To
Water Supply" No wonder he dozed off.

Didn't they realize they could watch TV?????

I ordered a pay per view movie called Nacho Libre...a Jack Black movie
from the Summer. It won't win any Oscars but the wrestling scenes were
funny and made 90 minutes of the flight go pretty fast. After that I
watched exactly what I would have watched if I was home...the Direct TV
feed was from NY.

The landing in Denver was the smoothest landing I can ever remember.
Amazing.

I had 90 minutes before my next flight so I made some calls and checked
my email and got on the flight to San Jose.

On this flight there was a seat between me and my seatmate....and she
read a book too!!! What is it with these people? I watched The Tonight
Show and Conan O'Brien and we were just about here.

A nice feature of Frontier's TVs is the live map channel. It
approximates where you are on a map...and tells you the speed and altitude.

My cousin Nancy picked me up a few minutes after 11 and I'm staying with
her tonight in the Willow Glen area of San Jose. She has a whole list
of errands for me to run tomorrow. The GPS will come in handy again!

I don't travel again till Sunday afternoon when I head for Salt Lake
City. So look for a new update late on Sunday night.

Thanks for reading!

Leo

Day 1 - My Cross Country Adventure...

I got to the airport about 45 minutes before the 12:55PM departure for
Baltimore. I've been on the route many times and wasn't worried about
too many lines. Sure enough no wait at the Southwest ticket counter.
BUT my bag was 3.5lbs overweight. I was prepared for this. I pulled a
small empty bag out of the big bag and filled it with some books I'd
brought and I put on my fleece sweater. New weight? 47.5!!
50lbs was the limit.

There was a longer weight than usual at the security checkpoint but no
big deal. They did take an interest in the small bag I'd just pulled
out. They ran it through the x-ray machine twice and then took it over
to the "special test" area. Finally she resorted to pawing through it
and felt a great sense of accomplishment when she pulled out a small
tube of toothpaste I'd left there from my last trip...before the new
regulations.

She gave me several options one of which included going back to the
check in counter (and through security AGAIN). I liked option 3. Toss
it! Ironically, it appears I did not pack any toothpaste. Oh well. I'm
sure Baltimore has a spare tube somewhere.

Once through security I barely had time to hit the bathroom and then
walked right onto the plane! I had my "A" boarding pass so finding an
aisle seat was easy.

As I watched people file in I noticed a woman make a beeline for the
center seat in front of my row. Her 80+ year old husband looked a
little bewildered behind her because there was no seat for him next to
her. I said to him..."you wanna sit behind her and hit her on the
head?" He said "yes" He was very talkative which I enjoyed...it made
the flight go faster. He was a WWII veteran and had been in the Albany
area visiting a war buddy he'd been in contact with but not seen in
person in 60+ years. A retired school superintendent from New Mexico he
and his wife are frequent travelers.

The flight was only 65 minutes and a little bumpy toward the end but my
conversation with Mr. Caster took my mind off it. They named one of
their boys Landry...after former Dallas Cowboys coach, Tom
Landry...anybody know Landry Caster from Texas?

My luggage was quite wet coming off the carousel but not damaged
inside. This was my fourth trip to Baltimore BWI this year so I have
the routine down pretty well.

Got to the Alamo car rental counter without much problem. The two
agents were helping other people so had a 10 minute wait here. I'm here
for two days but because of timing was being charged for a THREE day
rental. It worked out to something like two days and two hours. I
mentioned this to the agent...and how it was the 4th or 5th time I'd
rented from Alamo this year. He let me know of the option of bringing
it back earlier...which I kinda figured out on my own...but then he
decided to enter it in the computer as if I was picking it up a couple
hours later.

Opening my mouth there saved me $57. Don't forget to try it yourself!

I'm staying at a Bed and Breakfast in the Fells Point area of
Baltimore. It's right on the water...directly across from where they
filmed the TV show Homicide, Life on the Street from 1992 to
1999...according to a sign on the building. I didn't think that show
was on that long. The place is very nice and I look forward to
breakfast this morning!

Not sure if I'll make an entry everyday but Thursday night I head to San
Jose, through Denver on Frontier Airlines. Frontier has TVs in all the
seats so I'm quite looking forward to that. I will have Seinfeld Season
3 with me in case nothing good is on!!

Thanks for reading and have a great week!

Leo