F
lying…I dream about having wings (literal actual wings) and flying dreams are amongst my favourite. They make my heart soar.
But “real” flying? The kind you do in a plane?
No, please no.
Of course this comes as no surprise to anyone. Anyone who knows me knows how much I dislike flying. But even without my fear, I do wonder why it always has to be so stressful. Only a small handful of times have I had a trip be genuinely relaxing…this time, wasn’t one of them.
My current ship is in drydock, and since the break is only 5 days, and I would be truly useless during a drydock (plus my computers are all in storage) I opted to just take a brief vacation and stay with Amras in Florida and then we can both rejoin at the same time. Should been simple enough right? Wrong. You see, immigration laws say that no matter where you are from (and as a Canadian I can go back and forth across the US border as a tourist basically whenever) you cannot remain in the States for more than 48 hours if you are coming ashore as a crewmember of any type. Period. The end. Not allowed. And if they catch you trying to do it, you’re deported and barred. Clearly this was not a risk we could take for any reason, nor would I have ever wanted to do so anyway. So I booked a flight from Florida to Toronto and then a return flight back to Orlando the following morning. Even paid all the booking fees and everything in advance, like a good girl.
And then came the day itself…
Debark…I can’t comment on…I mean well, I could, but I try not to talk a huge amount about work and debark is not really in our control. I can say this: it was long, it was convoluted, there were many delays that were out of our hands, and it was made even more so by the fact that a huge amount of people are coming on just for drydock (that’s the other reason I was more than willing to leave for five days) – by the time we finally got off the ship it was after all, by the time we got to the airport it was noon.
Although I did spend the rest of the afternoon playing giant Jenga with some fellow crew members at a restaurant down the street from the airport (our flights weren’t till late) so that part of the day was fun,
Eventually I loaded myself onto the flight, stowed my careful-packed-and-weighed carry on properly in the bin above me (zipper side out, so that I can actually access it …because…I’m short)..and tried ot settle in as everyone else found their places. This is when my first ick-moment took place: one of the last people on the plane was a lady with a slightly over-sized carry on, who refused to check it. She never said why, and I know I shouldn’t judge, but I also never saw her access it once during the flight so whatever was in it couldn’t have been that essential. So she refused to check it, even though the stewardess kept telling her she should – and as a result, she ended up insisting it be put in one of the bins, which had the knock down effect of all the other bags that were stowed in that bin already (y’know from those of us who carefully followed instructions and were legitimately in earlier boarding zones that hadn’t been warned that we would have to check our bags, unlike the zone the lady in question was in) – reorganized, and crammed so close together (facing the wrong way) that they ended up completely locked in place, totally inaccessible. All the stuff I bring with me to keep me from freaking out on flights? Including my sleeping pills? Were in that bag…and I couldn’t get to any of it. All so that one person could force in a bag she didn’t even need access to.
Thanks.
But obviously I survived. So I get to the airport, and pay an outrageous amount to get to the Motel I was supposed to be staying at.
Now I had booked a Motel 6 because I was actually trying ot be smart. I was thinking, hey, I’m only there for one night, I’m trying to be smart with money, do I really need to pay $200 for a pool and a sauna and a movie library I’m not even going to be able to use? And I’ve terrible motels/hotels all over the place, I figured it couldn’t be that bad.
Ooooh I was wrong.
I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t. I was in that building a grand total of 10 minutes before telling the clerk to call me a taxi and high-tailing it to the nearest best western. The motel refused to give me a refund, nor had they given me a receipt, so I just had to eat the cost of the “room” and the taxi back and forth. But the second taxi driver was nice and his prices much more reasonable, and even he said “yeah, that’s a bad place”…which assured me I had definitely made the right choice in turning tail.
Long story short(er), I reboarded my next flight this morning with no cash left, and running on 2.5 hours of sleep…for the first time in years I was tired enough that I was actulaly able to sleep on the flight..
And I won’t be actually inOrlando – where Amras is picking me up…
Hey! At least I’ll sleep well tonight!