July 4, 2013 Happy Fourth of July Everyone!

July 4, 2013  Happy Fourth of July Everyone!

No pictures this time.  We are back in the US.  We highly recommend Delta Airlines to anyone who has to take a trip, either foreign or domestic.  Although we had a screaming child the entire time and I had to turn my headphones up to block him out and Bill’s TV/Movie console didn’t work exactly right, the Delta staff and crew were wonderful both on the way to and from Europe.  I left my JEL traveling jacket on the plane in Atlanta and didn’t discover it until we were almost on the plane train to the next terminal.  A staff member went back on the plane and retrieved it for me.  The food was good and they served drinks or cold water at least four times during the course of the flight.  We took Carey Limousine to our house once we arrived in Indy – another great service – no parking bill and no inconveniencing friends or family. 

Another nice thing – on a trip to Europe, you used to have to grab your luggage upon arrival in the US and schlep it to another carousel and wait in line for customs.  They took care of all that at the Dublin Airport.  We got off the plane in Atlanta and went to our plane to Indianapolis and didn’t have to deal with our bags until we got to Indy.  We have been so lucky:  not one train, plane, or bus delay or cancellation.  Every hotel but one had our reservation when we got there and the one that didn’t upgraded our room.  A word of advice:  e-mail your hotels prior to getting there and check your planes frequently in case anything changes.  Sometimes the hotels will have great ways of getting from the airport that you haven’t discovered.  We did institute a policy of taking cabs from the airport to the hotel when we arrived in a strange city – just in order to get the lay of the land and to talk to one of Europe’s great cabbies. It’s frustrating to arrive somewhere and not know exactly where you are going.  But we usually took an alternate bus or shared ride service back to the airport when we left a place.  Since this was our last flight and it was the big one, we took a cab to the airport.  Our cabbie’s name was John and he brought us from the airport to our hotel last Thursday.  He offered to come get us and we settled on 6am, not knowing if he would remember.  He showed up at 5:30 and decreased our travel anxiety a lot. 

I have so much more to write on this blog that I will attempt to backtrack to things remembered.  I still want to get to 3000 page views.  It’s nice to be home.  Our niece Michele is here with us, and we went to our neighbors Adam and Vera McDonald's yesterday for welcome home wine and dinner out.  It was a great day!

I got through 3 months worth of mail and we got unpacked.  Lots of summer projects to get underway.