Flying from IAD aka Dulles the Pain-In-the-Butt-Airport

Photo of Son taken by B on the drive from SC

My granddaughter is here. She took some pictures and got them transferred to my computer. That works.

Son's Graduation photo on the bulletin board in his room - taken by B

She came down and helped put the mainsail on the boat.

Our boat in the marina-B's photo of me walking by the boat

B's photo of the Mast

We watched a video tape on Tallin and some of the CD that we got from the Statendam to show her what the ship might look like. We managed to activate and program the tri-data phone that we have rented for use in Europe (I have to de-activate it and send it back when we get home) . She soaked her foot this evening (she had an ingrown toenail). Bob has practiced turning on the computers and accessing email. I have set up the computers so Bob can get emails on pocketmail.

She can't find her student ID so maybe she left it home. If she finds it, it would be good that she has it for St. Petersburg, but if not it is no biggie.

I think I'm packed. My suitcase is very heavy because I have soap and bleach for the laundry in it, but it is still under 50 pounds. Thinking that maybe I will switch those two items to B's bag. With nothing in it my bag is under the 62" that is allowed. I hope it has not bulged over the limit. B does not have a money belt or anything like that, and I can't find the one I had for her cousin to use. The thumb drives that I ordered have not come, so I will have to use the one that I have.

It has turned hot and sticky. I hope thundershowers don't delay us like they did with her brother's flight. I still don't have our cabin number, but if they do like they did in Barcelona with the Jade, they had people at the curb telling people what their cabin numbers are so they don't have to carry all their luggage on.

9 June 2009

We left from home about noon June 9th, and it took us about an hour and 45 minutes to drive to Dulles.

On the beltway going to Dulles

Bob unloaded us at section 3, and we straggled inside with our bags. Most of the SAS counters were closed. I suspect that this is the only SAS flight there is from that airport. But very shortly a lady appeared and checked us in and gave us our boarding passes. A man, took our bags (didn't ask me to make a name label but this is a non-stop flight) and said mine was 21 kilos. I later asked Bob how many kilos to a pound and the said 2.4 which would be 50.4 pounds, but when I looked it up later 23 kilos was the maximum weight. That would be more like 2.2 kilos to the pound or 46 lbs plus.

The lady told us to sit on the A/C seat and she would send us a wheelchair. Which she did.

Inside the airport (seated)

My carry-on is also very heavy. After we stopped for B to use the bathroom, we went through security, and the wheelchair guy got us onto the people mover and out to the gate - well in advance of the flight.

Granddaughter in people mover

I tipped him about $2.00 There were several people with small children including a pregnant lady traveling by herself with a small child. One of the children spent a lot of time shrieking. B bought a soft pretzel and blue ice.

We boarded with the group of people needing assistance. We were in 35 G-H which was a window and an aisle.

Looking out the window of the plane at the gate

I thought B would like to see out the window, so I let her have the window seat. But she said not, so next time I will take the window which I really prefer because I found I can't sleep in an aisle seat and she was curled up to try to sleep in a way that would have worked just as well in an aisle seat and such a position would not be available to me.

As usual in June, the flight was delayed by lightening storms from 5:15 to about 8:45. We sat on the taxi-way with the engines off for most of that time.

Seatback camera while we waited on taxiway

At one point I went up to the bathroom and said I was hungry, so they gave us some cracker type snacks. We finally got dinner about 10 pm

SAS does not give you any choice of food. There was no - beef or chicken question. For dinner we had a salad, chicken and potatoes

Chicken dinner

Two whole wheat rolls and butter, two crackers, a slice of cheese

and a cheesecake. They don't give you hot towels or eye masks or anything like that but they do have a free drink with the meal, even in economy. No rum though - the lady across from us asked. The people in front of us were (as we found out when landing) going to be on the same ship as ours, and the girls across from us were going on some kind of Methodist missionary thing to the Baltic states from NC

A lot of the announcements were in other languages first - must have been Swedish, Norse and Danish because I couldn't understand them and they took twice or three times as long as the English ones.

Although there is no choice of dinner, they do have the TV screens in the seatbacks which has a forward camera and a camera that shows what is below you. Their moving plane has all north up displays except one which is course up which at first was confusing until I realized what it was. We didn't originally have earphones at our seat, but I saw some in the seat ahead and took them before those people had boarded.

They also have a choice of movies (B watched the Pink Panther), games and audio tapes or to watch the moving plane. With the engines off on the taxi-way, most of the options are not available. I tried to listen to the comedy channel and was told to chose another one. Eventually I did get to it, and it was Victor Borge. The games were not available for very long in the flight - you had to run them with a controller which was in the seat arm attached by a cord. I played backgammon and then I tried tetris, but the instructions for what keys to push didn't really work for me. After awhile, all the games returned you to the main screen as they had been turned off.

My granddaughter's photo of me with a magazine

The in-flight magazine had none of the options I'm used to with AA. No crossword - no airport maps. They did have a selection of other magazines and papers available and for awhile I looked at Boat Sales magazine.

I changed the camera time, but absolutely could not change my watch time no matter how hard I tried. That would be why a watch for B would be a good idea. Just a cheap Timex triathlon watch is what I have.

I just did not sleep as well as I usually do. There was no foot rest, and I dozed but didn't sleep.

Bottled water at our seat

SAS gave us big bottles of water at each seat. B brought hers off the plane with her, but I had another bottle and my SAS one was empty so I left it.

Normally if I get some sleep on the airplane, when I get to somewhere, I can keep going until after dinner of that day and then crash. This time not. And B didn't sleep much either. The boys were much more resilient about sleep. My ribs hurt and kept me from sleeping, and I couldn't keep my head steady so it would fall forward or sideways and wake me up. Having an aisle seat was good in that I could get up and use the bathroom easily and the bathrooms were near us.

I did eventually get my watch set so that it is the correct time here, but for some reason the information screens on the flight kept saying (like they did on a previous flight) that the time at our destination was 5 hours different. I finally asked the flight attendant and he confirmed that it was 6 hours difference.

Europe from a plane

Breakfast on SAS

They gave us breakfast which was a ham and cheese sandwich, a thing of yogurt, OJ (I gave my OJ to B) and tea or coffee. I had tea, B had coffee. They came around and asked me if I needed wheelchair assistance and I said yes.

Landing Copenhagen

She asked me how the flight was, and I said it was very smooth. She told me that there were seven of us on the plane who had requested wheelchairs, and I should be sure to identify myself to them.