When your flight is grounded or delayed you need to act fast to get a seat on the next available flight. Get in line with other passengers…but boost your chances of grabbing a seat on the next flight by also calling the airline’s 800 number. You may have better access to that airline’s agents and therefore a set.
You could program your airline’s 800 number into your cell phone so you don’t waste time looking it up. Don’t know the 800 number? Go to http://tollfreeairline.com to find those numbers.
Month: January 2009
Waiting in Line
Worried about the wait for security screening? Did you know you can find estimated wait times on the TSA’s website, www.tsa.gov, which includes information for most US airports. The site doesn’t offer actual wait times, but it does show the average and maximum wait times for the past month.
Many airports offer the same service. Theirs are usually current or fairly current wait times. Check out your airport’s website for information. It just may save you some time or grief.
Leaves of California
Doesn’t look like an evil tree now does it? But as it sheds its gazillion tiny leaves and they drop into the front yard, on to and across the roof, and blow into the pool…my thoughts about it are not real pleasant. I know…I know…I could be shoveling mountains of snow back in Iowa. So I’ll stop complaining, suck it up, and rake those gazillion leaves. Then I’ll skim the pool so it doesn’t look like it has a rug laying on top of it…a rug of leaves.
Ahhhh, the results of my efforts. A clean pool.
Mr. Scoop, the Pelican, guards the front walk. But he doesn’t guard for leaves.
And Myron has adjusted quite well…again. Seems to make himself at home all over the house.
Since this is supposed to be a travel blog, I will now get back to writing about travel, travel tips, and places to go. I promise.
Jelly Belly Fun
Just up the road about 15 minutes is a Jelly Belly Factory. For those of you that think Jelly Bellys are just another jelly bean…not so my uneducated sweets. This is the original gourmet jelly bean made famous by then President Ronald Reagan. Did you know they were staples in the White House at that time?
Did you also know that it takes up to 21 days to make a Jelly Belly bean? And there are 50 official flavors. They even have recipes so you can make your own specialties. How about a root beer float or lemon meringue pie?
And guess what they call the ones that don’t shape up to perfection?
Belly Flops
Good News
Everything is here (almost). We are only missing a couple of things. And we do have one box of stuff that doesn’t belong to us. Since everything was loaded and reloaded three times, that’s pretty amazing.
Looking west from our front door are the “mountains”. Those of you from Colorado are (a.) silently laughing or (b.) thinking I’ve lost it or (c.) wondering just where are the mountains, because all you see are some hills. These mountains don’t see snow, have very few rocks, and you need to imagine any jagged peaks. But for this terrain…these are the mountains. So quit laughing and take a look at the orange tree in our neighbor’s yard.
Oh, by the way, on the other side of those mountains is wine country. Now who’s laughing?
Now if the Furniture Would Just Arrive…
Winter weather in the Midwest and the fact that our furniture was put on 2 different trucks instead on of one held up delivery to us. Being the resourceful people we are, we didn’t let lack of furniture hold us hostage. After all…we had wine glasses.
Time to mow our front yard. This can be done with a reel mower (no gas) in about 10 minutes. Takes longer to rake leaves from the huge Chinese Elm tree than that.
But it does tire one out.
Myron adjusted well. He even found out how to get on the counters. Obviously he was booted off right after I took his picture.
Mable was fine as long as she had her basket. Life is good…
The Trip To California
What was between us and our destination was ONLY Donner Pass. Now one would not think a pass of less than 8,000 feet would cause so much trouble. But…remember the Donner Party and all that? Well we didn’t have to resort to any unacceptable eating habits, but it was still a challenge. It’s a fairly long climb to the top. It seems even longer when it’s dark, it’s snowing, it’s blowing, it’s slippery, semis are crawling to your right side, and snow plows on your left and in front of you are flinging snow and rocks into your path.
Arriving at the summit we were greeted by two signs. One said trucks must use their lowest gears for the 40 mile descent. That’s right…40 miles of winding roads going down. Did I mention it was snowing and blowing and slippery? The other sign said “chains will be required in 30 minutes”.
Since the road appeared to be drivable, we kept on going. Yes, we also used low gear. I think we saw or passed two vehicles and one or two passed us. The semis had all stopped to put on chains.
Oh dear…
As we hit the valley, snow disappeared and darkness was a welcoming site. No snow or blowing here.
We made the drive from Denver through windy Wyoming and over snow covered Donner Pass in 21 hours. Were we ever glad to see the hotel in Vacaville.
Myron and Mable slept through the whole ordeal. Oh to be a cat…
Across Wyoming, Through Utah…
Iowa and Colorado are behind us. Wyoming was a pain, with I-80 full of semis and wind gusts of over 40 mph. When we hit Utah the snow almost looked good on the red rocks at dusk.
We zipped right through Utah and on to Nevada. Casino towns hover along I-80 in Nevada so that was about our only choice to eat. However, Jim left Winnemucca with $26.00 more than when he arrived so guess the stop was worth it. Next up California.
Little did we know what was ahead of us…
Leaving Iowa in December
After over 50 years in the state of Iowa, we made a move to Northern California. The good news and the bad news…we moved in December. Boxes filled the house, a semi moving van filled the driveway, and snow filled the yard. It was sad to leave good friends but exciting to look at new possibilities. The cats, Myron and Mable, took it all in stride.
The day I left we had over 12 inches of snow and Brendan had to help me get out of their driveway. With a van full (and I do mean full) of stuff off I headed to Denver to pick up Jim. Snowy roads just slowed me down a little.
More to come on the drive from Denver to Vacaville…