Travel Woes

We are finally home after quite the adventure trying to get back! Final tally: 2 days of vacation, 6 days of trying to travel. The math seems wrong there, doesn't it??


It started off with Saturday's flight being weathered out and being told there were no seats on any flights until Tuesday. Unfortunately that turned out to be a big fat lie, because a plane left on Sunday and flew straight to Baker during a weather clearing...and the kicker was that it flew with TWO people on it. Huh. Go figure.

Monday was a blizzard anyway, so that was fine. Tuesday, we made it to Churchill, Manitoba and were being held there for a bit. Eventually, we were put on the jet to fly to Rankin Inlet, Nunavut. There, we were told our plane was holding...in Churchill. Let me repeat that - our jet was sitting next to the plane that was coming to Rankin to fly through to Baker. And we were on it originally, but they moved us off of that to fly us to Rankin...where we were waiting for the plane in Churchill (where we just came from). Can someone explain why this makes sense??

Another sad twist of fate is shortly after the jet turned around and went back to Winnipeg, our flight to Baker was cancelled due to weather and the plane was staying grounded in Churchill. So now we missed an opportunity to go back, and are now stuck in Rankin. Where the cheapest room I could find was $300/night vs. $150/night in Churchill.

We were miffed to say the least.

Luckily, we were taken in by a friend of a friend (whom we have never met) and were able to save money on hotel. Words cannot express my gratitude for his kindness! As a small thank you, I made dinner for everyone that night - Tuesday - and we settled in to fly out on Wednesday.

Wednesday, we get to the airport and the morning flight has been cancelled due to weather (it's been a blizzardy week!) but there was a flight leaving at 6pm if the weather cleared up. But there were no seats on that plane, so we complained that we've been trying since Saturday to get home, and all of a sudden, seats magically appeared. So we left our luggage at the airport with the agents and went for lunch. When we came back at 5pm, the airport is basically closed, and there is a sign saying all flights were cancelled. Our bags are just sitting there unattended.

Sigh. Another night in Rankin, imposing on this poor stranger! We were too dejected to eat, so we picked up some snacks at the convenience store and went to bed fairly early. Thursday dawned with clear skies and we had the go-ahead that our flight was leaving at noon. When we got to the airport, it was packed with everyone trying to get on flights since it was the first day in almost a week that planes weren't grounded, so it was a bit chaotic. We arrived in Baker a few hours later than anticipated, but home nonetheless. I have never been so happy to see Baker Lake, nor have I been kissed with such ferocity by my puppy (awwww).

It was a long journey, but we're finally home! Just in time too, since we woke up today to a blizzard  - so if we didn't make it when we did, who knows when we would have!

We joke that our 2nd year of marriage has certainly started off with an epic adventure - who knows what the rest of this year will bring!!

-L