Getting to Hawaii seemed to be easier. A brief stop to change airplanes in California and then you find yourself with a lei around your neck on a beach somewhere. This time the trouble started early. Jo decided to buck the trend of not planning till the very end by buying plane tickets six months early. Then, almost immediately she started getting weekly emails about how the flight had changed till the itinerary was eventually unrecognizable and it would take us far longer to get there. A week before we were due to leave, Jo realized she could get a full refund from the airlines if we decided to cancel because the itinerary had changed so much. So she booked us a second set of tickets that got us to Hawaii faster. Then she found a third slightly better itinerary, so she booked that too. Then she cancelled the second and I called and cancelled the first, and we were set. Itinerary #3 wasn't great but still better than the others. We'd leave home at about 5:30am on Wednesday and get into our rental at 11:30pm that day - which is about 3:30am the next day in Austin - so about 22 hours larer.
The flights were all on time. Though it felt like we had made no progress at all when several hours later we were still in Houston due to a long scheduled layover. But the kids got a chance to eat a real breakfast and run around. Here, they are hamming it for the camera at the Cat Cora's Kitchen in Terminal E.
Then, for the next leg, a passenger on the seat behind Carol got into it with an attendant because she refused to put her small non-roll-on luggage below by her feet and instead wanted her bit of overhead space. At LAX we ate an early dinner and then Vivian used Grandma's cane to practice Tae Kwondo. The kids read. They snacked. They asked how much longer several hundred times. Then we boarded our last leg and found a passenger sitting in Jo's seat. She eventually had to be threatened with evection from the plane by the ticketing agent before she finally gave up and went to her assigned seat so Jo could sit.
The flights were all on time. Though it felt like we had made no progress at all when several hours later we were still in Houston due to a long scheduled layover. But the kids got a chance to eat a real breakfast and run around. Here, they are hamming it for the camera at the Cat Cora's Kitchen in Terminal E.
Then, for the next leg, a passenger on the seat behind Carol got into it with an attendant because she refused to put her small non-roll-on luggage below by her feet and instead wanted her bit of overhead space. At LAX we ate an early dinner and then Vivian used Grandma's cane to practice Tae Kwondo. The kids read. They snacked. They asked how much longer several hundred times. Then we boarded our last leg and found a passenger sitting in Jo's seat. She eventually had to be threatened with evection from the plane by the ticketing agent before she finally gave up and went to her assigned seat so Jo could sit.
We landed in Lihue after dark, rented a Jeep and drove off towards the even darker sparsely inhabited North Shore. After one drive-by we located the rental and we carted the kids up the stairs and into their beds and I opened a bottle of wine.
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