Back Home Again

Friday morning, we are up early and have breakfast at the Lunenburg Inn, rearrange and re-pack our bags in the parking lot, hoping they are all 50 lbs. or less. :) We have a scenic drive back to the Halifax airport, return the rental car, and go to check in. We are several hours early since we do not want to pay for an extra day of car rental and have to have the car back by 11 AM. When we check in, we are asked if we want to go to Newark on an earlier flight, which sounds good to us. One bag is 52.5 lbs. but the attendant at the counter lets it slide. We will have to repack in Newark! We finish some postcards and last minute airport shopping, grab some lunch, and get on our way. Security is so much nicer in Halifax than in the US! They help everyone get their stuff into bins and onto the conveyor belt with a friendly attitude and a smile. Rich's backback gets flagged for further searching and the woman nicely explains what she is doing, finds some small rounded scissors and lets them pass. We then go through US Customs at the Halifax airport, answer some questions and are told "welcome back." We arrive in Newark with no trouble whatsoever and spend $25 plus tip on an estimated 3 mile ride to the hotel. What's up with that??? We are staying at the Country Inn and Suites, which happens to be right across the street from a mall. It looks pretty dull and run down from the outside but we walk over anyway to browse the stores and get some supper. It's HUGE! We can't believe how misleading the outside is. There are so many stores and so many winding hallways that we could easily get lost. It's also very nice, well kept, clean and fancy on the inside. We find Borders Express and I stock up on bargain books (Rich says, "you're carrying those, right?" remembering the suitcase weights from earlier in the day. :)) We eat supper at Chili's and stop at a chocolate shop for some "dessert" for later.

Saturday, we have to get up at 5:15 AM to go back to the airport. We repack bags again and catch the airport shuttle at 6:00. We check our 49.5 lb. bags and watch the sunrise over NYC as we clear security (no problem with the little scissors in Newark!). It's an uneventful, though very long day. Six hours from Newark to Seattle, a plane change and HALLELUJAH, we finally get to use our First Class upgrade from Seattle to Anchorage, which actually provides us with a salad and a sandwich for lunch, and all of that extra room....very nice. We arrive in Anchorage ten minutes after our Dutch Harbor flight was supposed to board, but knowing Pen Air and Dutch Harbor flights, we are not exceedingly anxious. It's also overcast and raining in Anchorage so we are not even sure if we will be going. Sure enough, we learn that our flight is delayed due to "plane arriving late," and finally leave for home at 6 PM. Our long day of travel comes to an end at 9 PM (which would be 2 AM Halifax time). We are tired but glad to be home and to see our cats, who are always skittish when we have been gone for awhile and act like they don't know us or are mad at us for leaving!

It's been a great trip; we had such a good time everywhere we went and hope you have enjoyed our diary and photos as much as we have enjoyed doing it!

9/9/2007 : view on map : permalink : add a comment