Greek Cruise Day 10...

Day 10 – Friday

The day started with the alarms going off at 4… Showers and final packing, triple checking drawers, checking for passports and other documents, and to the checkout at the gangway… Had our passports stamped, everything loaded onto the bus, and about 8 couples were headed to the airport… about a half hour trip to the airport, and then we got the bags sorted out and went through the first security check at the Istanbul airport… then to the baggage check in, where we got all of our boarding passes (some of the others only got the first one…) and had our passports looked at and scanned again… then down the hall (literally…) and through bag and body scan number two… then a long walk down to the gate and we sat outside the gate area, where there was security scan station number three… These were all luggage on scanner, laptops out, through a metal scanner stations… don’t know where they thought we were going to get anything along the way, but I guess it’s good to know they are careful… I had to explain to one of the security guys what my iPad stand was… he sort of thought it could be a weapon… Time passed pretty quickly and soon we were on the plane… Turkish Airways… Needless to say I wasn’t expecting much, but other than the fact that the guy in front of me almost immediately reclined his seat and my knees were in my face the rest of the time, the service and food on the plane were great… Now one interesting point… we get scanned three times for weapons, get on the plane, and right away the pass out a meal with metal knives, forks, and spoons… far more dangerous than the iPad stand that was questioned, but whatever… And I have to hand it to Turkish Airways on two other counts… One is that I can’t remember the last time that I had a meal (that was actually edible…) on a 2.5 hour flight… and Two (and at least as important…) it was the first flight that I have been on in years where the stewardesses were all actually attractive, young, and slim… Turkish Airways… who would have thought…?

Landed in Munich right on time, and it is a really nice modern airport… as opposed to the Istanbul one, which is sort of a mess and not labeled that well, at least for non-Turkish folk… Got our passports checked when we got off the plane, and then the first (you can probably guess that there was more than one…) scan of everything about 100 feet later… Guess they thought that we might have picked something up on the plane that we didn’t use… Then a long walk through the shopping district in the Munich airport, and down to our gate area, and (of course…) full scan number two… And the security guard there picked up on the iPad stand also and needed it to be explained… although he got it pretty quick… Either all of the US airports know what it is when they see it in the scanner (doubtful…) or they just don’t give a crap… (more likely…) Then a short walk, another passport check and a bunch of questions (do you have any weapons, anything illegal with you, stuff like that that of course someone that is going to do harm would just have to say “damn, you caught me… I give up…”) and finally to the gate… Passed the time talking to Bob, the Cooper regional BDM from the western region, and then they started to board…

The plane was an Airbus 330… We had seats right in front of the wing, and I really wasn’t looking forward to the flight, since the one over on US Airways was cramped, hot, and pretty miserable… but this was way different… The seats were much larger, very comfortable, and each had a screen on the back that you could choose from a whole bunch of movies, tv shows, or some other stuff… very modern and looked almost new… If I fly overseas again, I’ll be checking to see what kind of plane, and this isn’t bad…

The 9.5 hours to Philadelphia went by fairly quick… The plane had small monitors on the back of all of the seats, and a great selection of movies and tv shows to pick from… After a nice lunch, I watched Soul Surfer, The Lincoln Lawyer, and a few tv shows from the list (and they didn’t cost a thing…) and then finally watched The Company Men that I had rented on my iPad… Landed on time in Philadelphia, and getting through customs and security (for the umteenth time in one day…) went fine and then a shuttle to the gate for the puddle jumper back to Harrisburg… A 20 minute flight later and we were finally home… Only problem was that my checked on suitcase never made it… Ann’s did, but somehow, after getting the bag from Istanbul to Munich to Philadelphia, our home team at the Philadelphia airport somehow screwed it up and it never made it to Harrisburg… Not a huge problem, since it didn’t have anything in that I needed that night… (they did get it to the house by noon on Saturday…)

Got home, and forced myself to stay up until about 10 (which was basically 24 hours from when we got up in the morning…) and then pretty much collapsed…

What a great trip… Better than I expected on all counts, and I can’t believe that I am actually looking forward to doing something like this again… (anyone who knows me understands that…) But it is good to be back home with the kids, and it will be good to get back to work on Monday…