This is day 5 of our Austria Adventure. Glenn and I are hoping to catch a space A flight to Germany and end up in Austria before January 5th. Kyle decided about a month ago to get married while visiting his girlfriend Maggie. We are thrilled with the news but decided to go the cheep way and use one of our military benefits. If there is space on military transport planes we can fly free. As retires we are at the absolute bottom of the list though. Knowing how this works, you have to be very flexible and willing to hang out in a terminal for hours or possibly days. This made great sense on Sunday when there was a flight with 105 seats but just before leaving Glenn discovered his passport expired 10 days ago. A new plan took shape in a few short hours. He got an appointment in Philly at the passport office on Monday morning. They can expedite the process to get a new one. Trying to beat the snow we left for Philly Sunday night. We didn't quite beat the storm but did arrive safe and sound. We chose a hotel within a few miles of the office so if the roads were too bad GLENN could walk there. I would remain in our warm hotel room. Monday morning feeling optimistic we checked out of our hotel and navigated the snow covered streets to the passport office. The downtown businesses were busy shoveling sidewalks for any brave soles that would venture through their doors. That is all but the one we cared about. A sign written on plain white paper hanging on the door, "Building Closed due to the Snow". So Sunday Night Football and the Passport office would be canceled until Tuesday. Glenn rescheduled his appointment for Tuesday and we went back to the hotel for another night. On a positive note, we finally got to see newest Harry Potter movie.
With Glenn's new passport we headed for Dover AFB to see about getting a flight. We waited around for two days with several other families. As the hours ticked by the kids got wilder. It was quite comical, above the running and screaming an announcement could be heard "parents need to keep control over their children at ALL times, no running in the terminal". :)
Last night we made a decision to drive to NJ to another AFB since it sounded like there were more flights and seats available. This morning once again things change. The two flights with 73 seats each are reduced one flight with 8 seats, these were filled by two families in a matter of minutes. Ok, next chance at 6pm tonight maybe 73 seats. We have our laptops, movies, books and puzzles so here we stay hoping for the best.
Stay tuned for more updates. I am writing this for my sanity so you really don't have to keep reading I am sure you all have better things to do.
