Chasing the Sun

Traveling with Steve Horn makes me brave, delights me with unexpected surprises and tries my patience.  Please note that I did not say Steve tries my patience.  Our method of travel sometimes definitely does.  
 
However, we are determined to continue this way of getting around.  It keeps getting better!  Our first Space-A trip was too much of an adventure – from my going so long without sleep that I hit a wall and stretched out on the seats to sleep; to Steve’s inflating an air mattress and bedding down in the terminal.  

 

He has studied the Facebook pages of the travel hubs that we use and discovered the patterns of the chartered Patriot flights.  So for $36 total for both of us, we flew from Baltimore to Ramstein, Germany and from Ramstein to Aviano, Italy on a 767 for free.  We figure the $36 was because they served us both two meals on the flight!
 
Cory and Erika drove us to Union Station on a Monday and we sat and watched public service announcements about what to do in case of a terrorist attack while waiting for our train to Baltimore.  (What has happened to this world in which we live?  You can keep the soap box under the bed; that was rhetorical.)  
 
The train ride was short and we caught a shuttle to the airport.  We were high on the list and settled in to wait without a lot of anxiety.  There were many seats and not that many on the list.

After we grabbed a bite to eat, I went to check the waiting roster.  I heard cheering and applause; I had only eaten a chicken sandwich, so I knew it wasn’t for me.  I leaned over the railing to watch home-bound soldiers pushing their gear on carts through the customs doors to be greeted with signs, balloons, and hearty handshakes.  Boy and girl scouts in uniform at the end of the line handed them candy and held out plastic candy-filled pumpkins to little ones traveling with families. 
 

Our trip over was long; it always is.  The flight itself is eight hours and we lose six more crossing time zones.  We leave late afternoon and arrive in the morning with our bodies screaming, “It’s one AM!  Will somebody please put me to bed?”   We spend the last hour or so peering out the windows looking for signs of a sun rising.  Another hour in lines and going through customs (German customs officers can be a bit intimidating) and we finally walked out into a beautiful, crisp autumn day with bright red and gold trees.
 
I’ll pretty much always choose nature over anything manmade.  But between the trees and the new many-storied Ramstein Inn, it was no contest.  There were beds in there!  We were mentally ready to hunker down and sit, comatose, for hours in the lobby waiting for a room.  Steve walked up to the reservation desk, talked for a minute and turned around and grinned at me.  We were asleep by 10:00 AM!  We slept for a couple of hours and then got up so I could start planning when I could sleep again.  
 
Next morning Steve woke me with hot cappuccino and chocolate croissant.  Twelve hours of solid sleep and I was ready to fly again.  Next, on to Aviano and Popeye’s Fried Chicken!