Sorry for the delays, y'all. We had quite the adventure getting all nine of us across the pond this year. Everyone arrived in Dayton without issue (for the most part) and we packed up all of the gear, poles included, Wednesday morning. Upon arriving at the Dayton airport, we found our that the Regional jet that United flew from Dayton to Newark would not be long enough to carry the pole vault poles. In addition to our poles not being accepted, severe weather was rolling in and our flight was delayed. It wouldn't have been so terrible, except that Jodi had used the delay to go back to the ticket counter to meet an AIA staff member who was coming up to deal with the poles while we flew to Newark.
After boarding the plane in honest-to-goodness ten minutes, we made it to Newark with just an hour to sort out the pole situation and then fly out to Belgium. After being denied by UPS, FedEx, Delta, and some pole vault speciality shipping company, we finally settled on Brian (the AIA staff member) flying Southwest with the poles and meeting Jodi in Newark. Jodi would fly out the following day while the rest of the team flew ahead. Everything was going according to plan, until more severe weather rolled in to Newark. We were delayed an hour, then another hour, and then two hours. By the time 1:00 AM rolled around, they cancelled the flight, so we spent the next hour and a half at the ticket desk being booked on the July 4th flight to Brussels, which would have been terrible had we flown out and arrived on Saturday morning with a track meet Saturday evening.
After three and a half hours of sleep, I was back up searching for other flights and calling the United main 800 number (not helpful at all, by the way) in an attempt to get the team to Brussels before Saturday. I found a few options, which Dave took to the airport to try and get us rebooked. We were successful in that we all ended up being booked on flights that got us to Brussels by Friday evening. The only downside was that six people went Newark - Manchester - surprise reroute to Frankfurt - Brussels. I went with our pole vaulter Newark - Edinburgh (with just enough time to go see the castle) - Brussels. Jodi landed at 10 AM on Thursday, with my flight getting in at 4:45 PM and the Manchester/Frankfurt flight coming in around 5:15 PM. Our baggage was flown over at some point and we had to track that down in the lost luggage area, which ended up working out perfectly, so the eight team members who were rerouted ended up arriving at the Leuven train station from the airport at the same time. Jodi met us at the hostel and we headed over to De Appel for dinner, because I sure was not going to be cooking dinner after 48 hours of shenanigans.
Our first meal in country was easy and mindless because, after a crazy two days of traveling and then not getting back from a track meet until 2:00 AM on Sunday morning meant that I was just fried. It was spaghetti and y'all, I used sauce from a jar. It nearly killed me. So, there's no recipe to post tonight. Just go out and buy (or make) some sauce, some ground beef, some pasta, some good veggies, and follow the instructions on how to cook it. My next post will be back up to my usual standards.
After boarding the plane in honest-to-goodness ten minutes, we made it to Newark with just an hour to sort out the pole situation and then fly out to Belgium. After being denied by UPS, FedEx, Delta, and some pole vault speciality shipping company, we finally settled on Brian (the AIA staff member) flying Southwest with the poles and meeting Jodi in Newark. Jodi would fly out the following day while the rest of the team flew ahead. Everything was going according to plan, until more severe weather rolled in to Newark. We were delayed an hour, then another hour, and then two hours. By the time 1:00 AM rolled around, they cancelled the flight, so we spent the next hour and a half at the ticket desk being booked on the July 4th flight to Brussels, which would have been terrible had we flown out and arrived on Saturday morning with a track meet Saturday evening.
After three and a half hours of sleep, I was back up searching for other flights and calling the United main 800 number (not helpful at all, by the way) in an attempt to get the team to Brussels before Saturday. I found a few options, which Dave took to the airport to try and get us rebooked. We were successful in that we all ended up being booked on flights that got us to Brussels by Friday evening. The only downside was that six people went Newark - Manchester - surprise reroute to Frankfurt - Brussels. I went with our pole vaulter Newark - Edinburgh (with just enough time to go see the castle) - Brussels. Jodi landed at 10 AM on Thursday, with my flight getting in at 4:45 PM and the Manchester/Frankfurt flight coming in around 5:15 PM. Our baggage was flown over at some point and we had to track that down in the lost luggage area, which ended up working out perfectly, so the eight team members who were rerouted ended up arriving at the Leuven train station from the airport at the same time. Jodi met us at the hostel and we headed over to De Appel for dinner, because I sure was not going to be cooking dinner after 48 hours of shenanigans.
Our first meal in country was easy and mindless because, after a crazy two days of traveling and then not getting back from a track meet until 2:00 AM on Sunday morning meant that I was just fried. It was spaghetti and y'all, I used sauce from a jar. It nearly killed me. So, there's no recipe to post tonight. Just go out and buy (or make) some sauce, some ground beef, some pasta, some good veggies, and follow the instructions on how to cook it. My next post will be back up to my usual standards.
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