JOYS OF FLYING

The journey to get here has been crazy.

The day we were supposed to leave, I noticed that the news said that Southwest was having problems with their website. 

Hopeful that it wouldn't affect us we set off to the airport.

When we got there, the check-in luggage line was long.

I tried to get my boarding pass at a kiosk and it said our flight was cancelled.

Apparently everyone's flights were cancelled, hence the long line.

Once we got pretty close to the front, we realized that my dad could have gone in the short frequent flier line (don't know what it is called). 

So we got in that line and they said we could be put on the next flight--leaving in 30 minutes.

The security line was non-existent.

But apparently you can't use your temporary license in the security line?

SOME ONE PLEASE TELL ME HOW THAT MAKES SENSE!!!!! 

If I go to the DMV to get my license renewed because it is expired and they give me a new temporary license to use until my permanent one comes in the mail, what am I supposed to use?

Apparently I was supposed to bring the old expired one. Why. How the heck was I supposed to know that?? That doesn't make sense at all. But apparently you can't use the temporary one because you can just print it out which I understand, but if I am supposed to use that as a drivers license, why wouldn't the airport or DMV tell me to keep the old one with me too?

Ugh. So basically a really rude old lady made me get a full pat down and they went through my whole suitcase. 

I was the last one on the plane to Oakland, California.

Once we arrived in Oakland, we passed line after line of people who's flights had been cancelled and they were trying to figure out what to do. We went to the nearest gate that had a plane leaving to Seattle and my dad smooth talked him into letting us just jump on the plane whilst writing our names on a piece of paper. Kind of sketchy now that I think about it. If we had crashed they honestly probably wouldn't have known we were on the plane. 

Once in Seattle we checked the luggage claims for our bags that we were supposed to check on with Delta for our flight to Honolulu. Well....they bags never showed up. 

Since it was 1 in the morning and our flight was at 8 in the morning, we tried to catch up on some sleep. I've honestly always wanted to sleep in an airport like while I'm backpacking or something. I'll save you a crappy night of sleep--it sucked. I slept for probably an hour total because the bright lights remained on, the chairs all had armrests separating them, and there are cleaning crews at night that will vacuum right by your head (that is on the grimy floor of course). We later saw a couple that actually knew what they were doing because they had like a whole air mattress down and blankets.

Oh yeah, it's also freezing in airports.

Well good news, we make it to Hawaii--sans luggage--but we made it.

We try calling for 3 days to get our luggage and finally get a call that it is on a plane and will arrive Saturday afternoon.

We go to the airport and see them coming out of the luggage carousel and round the corner, but as we are taking the first two off the third one disappeared.

At this point I was really upset. 

If someone just stole half my stuff I was about to fight them for it haha

I walked around and checked out everyone else's bags. I walked up and down the street. I was about to go crazy. It had taken so long to get all that stuff back and I knew the airport wouldn't cover stolen luggage since it had already come out of their possession.

Finally my mom found it. Apparently they were supposed to have been flagged and a worker took one of them off to save for us. So it wasn't stolen--thank goodness. 

Now the biggest challenge is getting all out suitcases to fit in our little Elantra....