24

"Next year your skinny ass is mine!"

I arrived in Kona at 8:30 AM local time this morning. Exactly one rotation of earth after leaving Victoria. I'm not a big fan of traveling at the best of times. I like my own home and prefer to be there over other places but you won't hear me complaining when it's an Ironman I'm going to - especially the world championship - but the was one arduous trip.
I booked the flight Expedia and was pleased to find a flight 2 weeks out from the race at about $300 less than any other flight I've gotten there.
So I leave Victoria at 11:30 AM, fly to Seattle, sit for 6 hours, fly to Honolulu, sit for 90 minutes, then fly to Kona - in theory arriving about 12 hours after leaving.
The night prior to leaving a wind storm hit Victoria with a fury, keeping me awake most of the night but by morning it had largely blown out and all flights were on time.
I arrived at the Victoria Airport with plenty of time to have a bit of lunch but didn't count on the power being out. There was no food. The flight leaves as scheduled and about 50 minutes later we arrive in Seattle with what was inarguably the roughest landing I've ever experience. Some residue wind from the storm the night before hit us hard as we hit the tarmac. I was at the back of the plane and for a brief moment I believed the pilot had lost control. We were fishtailing back and forth and cries from terrified passengers unnerved me as much as the turbulence - the pilot, bless his soul, did not crash us and I, along with a few of the Lifesport gang got off the plane head to a fish place in the airport for a really nice meal. We were all starving. We would learn that their flight on Northwest is delayed 2 hours and my later flight will also be delayed about 45 minutes.
I don't mind the 6:45 wait as I have lots of work to do and I get lots done.
When it's time for me to check in I get to the Northwest counter to find the computers are down and we can't board. After about forty minutes a few nerds show up and fix the problem and we're allowed on the plane. It takes off about an hour five behind schedule for the six hour flight. I'm sitting beside a lady so obese she's not able to have the arm rest dividers lowered. Her flesh pressed against me for the entire flight. She never even got up to pee. Neither did I.
After some quick math I determine I would have about 30 minutes to transfer planes in Honolulu.
The inflight movie comes on - a stroke of luck - it's the Kevin Costner's Swing Vote. I thought it was a stroke of luck because I hadn't seen it and I mostly enjoy Costner. I did not enjoy this one. What an ill thought piece of trash, but I watched every minute to try and distract myself from the discomfort of being smooshed into the window.
At long last we touch down in Honolulu and my name, along with about a dozen others, is called. We are to report to the Northwest man waiting at the gate. I knew then we wouldn't be going to Kona tonight.
Of course I was right, but not for a moment did I really care. It would have been almost 11 PM by the time I would show up at the house. I didn't relish the idea of waking people up to find out where I was suppose to sleep.
We, the inconvenienced travelers after 20 minutes in a line up, are given two vouchers, one for a hotel and one for a meal. I'm told the meal voucher will work at the hotel or any vendor in the airport. We are told also to grab out checked luggage.
But the conveyor belt won't start. Instead an alarm starts up. For 15 minutes we listened to the ear grating screech of that thing. The crowd was getting hostile.
Suddenly it stopped, the belt started to roll and luggage began to pour out to a loud cheer from the crowd.
My luggage along with several other passengers is lost. I'm not really concerned about this as I assume it's just gone on ahead without us. This turns out to be true but it didn't stop one big son of a bitch from just losing it on the poor airplane rep. A few of us tried to calm the guy down but only half succeeded.
Now we're told to head out the of the airport where a shuttle will take us to the hotel. We're also told the shuttle comes every 10 minutes. 22 minutes later the shuttle arrives.
At 2 AM 14 and 1/2 hours later I lay down in the hotel bed. The place was had the smell and ambiance of the 70s but I was just fine with that. I don't recall sleeping so soundly in a very long time.
This morning things went mostly uneventful. My flight was scheduled for 7:30. Unfortunately the hotel cafe didn't open till 6:30 so I would have to use my voucher at an airport vendor.
No luck - the airport vendors didn't accept the vouchers.

So 24 hours after leaving Victoria I arrive in Kona and it's perfect here.
The universe was kind. It gave me something to write about.