I'd had visions of writing this entry last week from a sunny beach in Turks & Caicos. But, it just wasn't meant to be. First, let me say, I know no one wants to hear anyone complain about their tropical vacation, but seriously, what could go wrong, did.
I was determined to take one last romantic tropical vacation before the baby's arrival, so we booked seven days on a private island in Parrot Cay in Turks & Caicos (it's in the Caribbean if, like my mother, you've never heard of it).
With a proposal due at the end of October, I knew I was going to have to work on vacation, and purchased a new laptop to get the job done. Everything went smoothly until it was time to actually take the vacation. We woke up at 4 AM for our 7:30 AM flight and went to the airport only to find that Delta (yes, I'm naming names) moved the flight back by thirty minutes. This made our hour long connection layover in Atlanta less than thirty minutes.
Now let me mention that the last time we flew Delta connecting through Atlanta we experienced severe delays both ways, that finally resulted in us spending 2 extra days in Atlanta before we could get a flight home. My husband was determined to never fly Delta or connect through Atlanta again. Low and behold our next flight plan was exactly that, and I swore to him that history would not repeat itself.
We landed in Atlanta at 9:20 for our 10 AM flight, and we think we're going to make it. Then the flight attendant comes on the speaker and tells us that there's no gate available and we have to sit on the tarmac for 20 minutes. Yes, despite running full-out (pregnant) to the gate, the plane had already departed. The helpful Delta agent (I'm not even being sarcastic) booked us on an American Airlines flight from Atlanta to Miami and from Miami to Turks & Caicos. It doesn't arrive until 8 PM, but I'm just happy we don't have to fly on the next Delta flight 24 hours later. I would have done anything not to spend another unplanned night in Atlanta.
Of course, our flight out of Miami is now delayed by and hour due to lack of a flight crew. We land and go through immigration, but once we reach Customs, our bags are, of course, missing. Now it's a thirty minute drive then a thirty minute boat ride to our resort in Parrot Cay. I'm so distraught over the events of the day, I leave our travel documents in the van that brought us to the boat dock. I just had to make matters worse.
Fortunately, the hotel staff was fantastic. They called and located my travel documents and promised to have them brought to me on the morning boat. They also assured us they would check the airport the following day for our luggage so we wouldn't have to travel the distance back and forth to the airport.
After losing an entire day traveling the first day, we lost the entire day the second day tracking down our luggage that the airport said they couldn't locate. We finally received our bags in time for dinner.
The next day, I thought our vacation would finally begin. Our camera broke first thing in the morning, but I didn't let that get me down. We set up my laptop in a shady gazebo by the pool so I could finish the work I'd brought to complete. Things were going great, and I took a break to take a dip in the pool before finishing work for the day. By the time I came back to my work, my laptop (only 3 weeks old) had gone dead for reasons I've yet discovered.
Now the week's worth of work I'd brought would have to go unfinished, and I would miss two important deadlines for my editor. Now, I was truly crushed under the weight of all that had gone wrong in the first three days of our last vacation for Lord only knows how long.
The next day, we went to the beach and all was well, but the next two days were too windy and overcast to fully enjoy and our final day on the island it poured rain day and night. I'm grateful for fact that we could plan such a vacation, but we truly had only one day that was all it should be. In the long run, I would have been better off staying home. But, the best news was that despite the odds, Delta got us home in time to vote on election day for Barack Obama! Whoo Hoo!