the crater shirt

just a sort of interesting aside, something that just occurred to me recently. every time i go to a volcano i seem to be wearing the same hooded white shirt. exhibit A:


my first volcano ever - haleakala volcano on the island of maui in hawaii. after this we rode bikes down the road that led up to the crater - not my favorite thing i did in hawaii, but an experience none-the-less.

actually - i'm not sure if this counts, but the next volcano i *saw* was arenal volcano in costa rica. this happens to be an active volcano, so we didn't actually go to the crater, we just hiked around near the base of the volcano. which is why i've just decided to change the name of this post from "the volcano shirt" to "the crater shirt". i don't have any pictures of myself at this volcano, but i'm pretty certain i wasn't wearing the shirt.


after that i went to ometepe island in nicaragua, which is formed by two volcanoes. this is most definitely my least favorite volcano EVER (in my life-long experience of 4). not only was it a grueling, spirit-crushing hike to the crater. but when we actually got to the crater (which is now filled with water) it was so foggy that you couldn't even tell that you were there. i may look happy enough in this photo, but i was DEFINITELY not.


so i was a little leery of volcanoes after that (and rightfully so, i think). but i was persuaded to visit poas volcano, which is near to san jose. to reach the crater of this volcano i only had to sit on a bus for a couple of hours and walk about 15 minutes along a paved path. no problemo. it was actually kind of fun. aside from the whole sulfur smell... this volcano, while not ACTIVE active like arenal (no lava shooting out of it) is still sort of bubbling and spitting muck. apparently it still has the potential of erupting.

so yeah, volcanoes.

travel nightmares (part 2)

the return trip.

my flight back to costa rica last sunday was supposed to leave boston around 5:45pm and arrive in san jose around 11:30pm. i arrived at the airport in plenty of time, checked my bag, bought some more magazines (i brought back about 7 trashy celebrity magazines, like people, ok!, etc. - english mags are expensive here), and eventually made my way to the gate. i sat down with my book to wait for boarding to start.

as that time approached there was an announcement that there was going to be about a 30 minute delay due to some air traffic control issues in atlanta (my stopover destination). so i was a little worried at this point - my layover was only an hour and fifteen minutes - but i was pretty sure i could still make it. well. it turned out to be a little more than 30 minutes delay. by the time we actually took off we were an hour behind schedule.

so i try to enjoy my flight. but all that first class stuff on the way to boston kind of spoiled me... i was in the window seat (which i prefer), but the guy sitting in the middle has got all these business papers out and his laptop... he was certainly taking up more than his fair share of the space. plus there wasn't enough room for me to cross and uncross my legs easily. but i managed.

so as we arrive in the atlanta area we are told that due to air traffic control issues we are going to have to do the whole holding pattern, circling around thing for a while. people with connections are starting to get nervous, including me. but they make an announcement that since our delay is because of air traffic control issues that it's likely that connecting flights will be delayed as well. so i was kind of holding on to that hope, since i was supposed to be at work at noon on monday.

we finally touch down and of course it takes forever to get off the plane - even with people who didn't have connections staying in their seats. i rush up the ramp, and start scanning the connections board. and my flight is marked "departed". super. (i actually found out later that my flight had left a few minutes early - air traffic control.... right....). so i had kind of been expecting this... since when we actually landed was after the scheduled take off time for my connection.

so i'm off to the re-booking desk. of course there's a huge line because nearly everyone with a connection on our flight missed their connections. so at the back of the line there's this little machine that you scan your boarding pass and they can tell you if you've been re-booked on the next flight or whatever. and also it prints out any hotel vouchers that might exist. well, i got no info about my flight, but if i wanted to stay at the westin that night they had negotiated the low, low, special deal price of just $90. $90????!!!!! the woman mentioned that there was a huge info boards of hotels that were cheaper and closer to the airport just outside of security.

so i bypass the line (which is barely moving) and use one of the customer service phones. i probably waited nearly as long on hold as i would have in the line, but whatever. i eventually speak to an agent who tells me that the next flight to san jose doesn't leave until 10am and arrives in CR at noon. which is when i'm supposed to be at work. super. well, obviously that's not going to work out. but the good news was that since my checked bag and i both missed our connection, the bag would hang around at the airport until the next flight to its destination - which i would also be on. and the guy got me a business class seat. which was pretty exciting.

so with only a couple of things in my carry on bag i head out to the main terminal. after staring at the hotel board for a while and making a couple of calls to check on prices (it was one of those phones where you enter the number from the board and it just dials the hotel automatically) i decided to head for super 8, which had a free shuttle and internet. so i'm collected by the shuttle and whisked off to my hotel.

unfortunately the hotel isn't really near any thing that allows me to get food or anything else. but there are a couple of menus in the lobby and i end up ordering some pizza and chatting with some other random guests for a while. when my pizza arrived i went up to my room, crawled in bed, put a dvd in my new laptop (have i mentioned this? - so exciting, i love it.), and ate. before too much sleep it was time for me to head back to the airport. i had some free continental breakfast and we were off.

when i entered the terminal i was a little taken aback by the length of the lines... but being booked in business class (and seat 1A - which means that business class is the best class on this flight) i start looking for the first/business class short line - i know that i shouldn't be waiting in the lines with the "commoners" :P but even that line was outrageous. and then i realize that there's a whole other section of desks for international trips. so i start to wait in that line... because i really just wanted to speak to someone and make sure my bag was on this flight too. but then i went for the kiosks. i swiped my old boarding pass and lo and behold all my new flight info came up and that i already had 1 bag checked. awesome.

so without further ado, i make my way through security (there's actually a special, shorter security line for first and business class) get to my gate in plenty of time. i wait and read. and then we board. i'm offered a mimosa straight off the bat (ah... business class...). of course there was a little delay, mostly due to so many people having missed flights the day before, there was some confusion about luggage. but we eventually took off.

so i arrived in san jose around 12:45 - 13 hours later than i had planned on. i headed home and got a little nap in before trucking into school to see what was up. i did a couple of placement exams and then went back home, still exhausted.

so yeah. that was my nightmare travel story... now that i've got that out of my system i promise not to be so whiney on my next post...

travel nightmares

so here's the part where i complain about traveling... actually, i generally enjoy traveling (and i'm talking about the actual transportation portions of traveling, not just the being other places, which i obviously enjoy a great deal) - i like the airport, i like flying, i like buses and trains, i love people watching. but my last trip home was sandwiched by two not-so-hot travel days. actually three - but let me explain.

so on the friday before i left i tried to check in for my flights online. it's generally easier and i kind of like knowing that i have a head start on the whole thing. well. the confusion was that my flight was the return portion of my reward flight. and the week before two of the three flights needed to be rescheduled due to a cancellation (though i actually recieved some bonus miles because of this, which was AWESOME on the part of northwest). so the flights were booked through northwest. but my first flight was on delta, because northwest doesn't fly to costa rica (but delta is a "partner" for miles). so when i tried to check in on the northwest site i couldn't, because you must choose a departure city, and san jose isn't on their list. so i tried to check in on the delta site, but of my three flights home, they only had the first one correct - theirs. (the other two flights were on northwest)

so after i panicked a little, i decided that i would just go to the airport in the morning and sort it out then. well. when i checked in they printed out a boarding pass for my flight out of costa rica and for one of the flights that i was no longer taking and nothing for the flight that would actually take me to boston. though they seemed to understand that my bag should go through to boston. i decided to try to sort all this out with the northwest agents in atlanta.

so i arrive in atlanta (after a lovely flight in FIRST CLASS - my first time ever!) and because we've arrived internationally we have to collect all of our luggage, go through customs, and then recheck everything to our final destination. before just blindly throwing my bag on the belt to be rechecked, i decided to talk to one of the customer service agents to sort out all the nonsense. well i was in concourse E, which happens to only contain delta agents. so i go chat to this woman anyway, to see if she can help.

well, her computer is showing that i'm still on my canceled flights. which i tell i her i am not. so she tries to call northwest, but is somehow unable to speak to a real person (in retrospect this woman was not really helpful in the least). so what she can do is check my bag out of the airport - like atlanta was my final destination. so i would have to go all the way out to the south terminal, collect my bag from baggage claim there and then i can go to the northwest check-in desk on the north terminal and sort everything out with them and THEN go back through security and to concourse D, where my flight was leaving from. in about 40 minutes.


there's a train which connects all these parts - atlanta is a BIG airport
so obviously my bag is not on the baggage carousel by the time i've gotten out there. and i wait for what seems like FOREVER for it. finally it shows up and i run over to the northwest desk (cut to the front of the line because i'm a FIRST CLASS customer) and the woman is like, "oh, it looks like you've already checked in for these flights". super. but now it's too late to check my big bag (which contains - GASP! - liquids larger than 3 oz.!) so i'm pissed, run over to security, which is not that long of a line, thankfully, and i start tearing through my bag to get the liquids out and squeeze them into my quart-sized ziploc - which now no longer closes. luckily i breeze through security with no hassles and then i'm back on the train for concourse E.

so i'm hustling to the gate and luckily there are still some people waiting in line to board. again, being first class i cut to the front, and get on pretty quickly. i plop down in my cushy, first class seat, and the flight attendant says to me:

"can i get you something to drink?"

yes you can.

okay, so that feels like plenty of complaining for today. if you can imagine, the trip back was worse.