July 14

We were up and gone early.  Too early for the car rental as we had to wait for them to open!  To luck we took a wrong turn trying to find the rental car return place.  We had to go through a parking garage area so we missed it the first time.  Then we needed to find a place to park in the Hertz area, so really we only had to wait about 15 minutes.  They needed to see the car and replacement tire, and the contract that spelled out our coverage.  Then they told us to contact the mailing address for reimbursement procedures.  They don’t handle that at the actual airport.  Figures!  

Andrew found an abandoned cart so we could put our bags on that and only push one thing around and found where to check our bags.  Since Andrew flies so often we got to use a fast line!!  YEAH--Gotta love those perks!!  We checked our bags, paid a bit extra for the heavy one (For the record, that bag contained hiking boots and other shoes, ALL of our DIRTY laundry, coats, toiletries, and more, so it was hefty.); they then printed off our boarding passes for us.

We wound our way through tons of people for security.  Andrew bypassed all these people standing in line but knew what he was doing.  Those people were standing to check their bags at another airline (Delta’s was “downstairs.”).  Security took one look at Cheryl’s walking sticks and declared they had to be checked.  WHAT?  We tried to explain that they didn’t have to be on the way TO Venice, that they fit in the overhead just fine on top of the bags, but he just looked and repeated, “These must be checked.”  Okay, so Andrew’s bags had already gone through the scanner so Cheryl darted back downstairs to Delta only to find the “fast” line was now VERY long.  A very nice young lady recognized her from just a few minutes before and, after Cheryl explained that security sent her back to check the sticks, the young lady walked her to the next available clerk and they were checked, just like we’d had them coming over--rubber-banded together.  Interesting.  They then had to be taken to the “special oversize” check area.  The look on Cheryl's face must have been something as a young gentleman said he was going that way anyway and he’d take them for her.  Wonderfully nice people!!!  Ironically, they rode in the elevator together. :)  

Cheryl caught up with Andrew and she was then “randomly” chosen to be patted down.  Yes, randomly.  But it had to be randomly done earlier as they checked her name off of a list.  We are assuming it was because we tried to check her in online so often.  The rubber gloves were put on, and little white pads were rubbed on shoes, feet, and bottoms of pants, as well as the Chromebook, iPad (both had to be booted up to show they were operational), and hands.  They scrutinized the temporary passport and then, after a few more minutes, Cheryl was on her way.  

We still had plenty of time.  Our seats were near the back of the plane (again, great for bathroom breaks!!) and we were soon up and ready for our 10 hour 15 minute flight to the USA.

Since it was such a long flight we had one meal, and two snacks, movies, pillows, blankets, and earbuds and eye masks.  We watched Beauty and the Beast (even better than the first time we’d seen it), took a nap, read some of The Diary of Anne Frank (We both feel like we really needed to reread it since it had most likely been since high school and her story is now up front and personal.), slept some more, ate our meal and snacks, and soon landed in Atlanta.  It is weird flying over the ocean, as you can see white caps of the waves and the occasional ship.  It is pretty lonely out there, for a LONG time!!

Atlanta found us in LONG lines for customs, of which we were supposed to use these new automated devices to help speed up the process.  Of course, our TEMPORARY passports would not work so we waited and handed them off to a security officer at our turn.  Interestingly enough, no one asked if we’d brought anything back to declare.  He only asked if we brought any fruit back with us, and if we’d had any contact with livestock, of which we hadn’t except to take pictures (Remember earlier, the cows have bells!!).  

We needed to find our bags (and walking sticks!) and retrieve them and then wheel them to our waiting plane (which wasn’t hard to do but weird!! If we would have brought back something they’d want to actually look at then we’d have to have our bags handy so they literally EMPTY the plane and everyone has to take their own bag and get it to their next flight.  Ours were “checked” all the way to Indy so we didn’t have to do that step at least).  We then had to race UPSTAIRS to go through security AGAIN.  There was a pretty long line; Andrew had been TSA pre-checked so it was supposed to go quicker.  Cheryl actually was not but they opened up lines in the general security area so she was done about five minutes quicker, even with removing shoes and waiting on travelers in front of her that weren’t in any hurry!!  

We’d landed at the International Terminal and had to get to Terminal C.  We had two hours to start but everything took time so we raced and caught the train and raced some more and got there with just a few minutes to spare until boarding time.  Only to find the plane was delayed.  Oh, we could have walked slower. It was delayed again and it turns out the plane wasn't even there yet.  It finally arrived, people deplaned, the plane was “readied” for us, and we could finally board.  Then we sat on the tarmac for an hour waiting for LOTS of other planes to take off.  Later we heard that there were storms along the East coast that delayed flights everywhere.  

We landed at Indy about an hour and a half after we were supposed to (The pilot really made up time!) and John-Paul picked us up and we got to spend the night there.  In fact, we made it back just in time to read a bedtime story to Ariana and play a bit with Edward before we all called it a night.  The grands GREW while we were gone!!  And they were as glad to see us as we were to see them.

Nighty night.