Coming Home

We were so sad to end our trip, but were so excited to get back to the comforts of home and our families.  Now, we had literally traveled by planes, trains, and automobiles all over Europe, and had not had any real travel issues.  This luck ended as soon as we set foot back in the Good Ol' U.S. of A.  We were scheduled to fly from Athens to Newark, New Jersey, and from Newark, to Chicago, and then on to Dallas.  Well, due to complications with the subway system in Athens, which is still fairly new, we were at the airport, and through security, just in time for our flight.  Then after the ten hour plane ride, we reached the airport in Newark, and were greeted by a bit of rain.  Apparently, this bit of rain was enough to delay or cancel every flight leaving from Newark for the rest of the day.  Our flight was delayed enough to guarantee that we would miss our flight in Chicago, so we started looking for other options.  We stood in line for hours and ran all over the airport hoping to get on another flight, but all were delayed or canceled.  We decided to try and catch our original flight to Chicago since it had yet to be canceled and we assumed all of our luggage was in Chicago.  Our flight was delayed until 9:30PM (it was originally scheduled for 6:30PM). At 10:00PM they were ready to board, we tried to board, but they said or boarding passes, which we received in Athens, were no good, and we would not be able to fly.  I went a little crazy, and they finally gave us our seats.  We hadn't slept for over twenty-four hours!!  Once we were all on board, and kind of relieved, the captain announced that the flight attendants had been on duty too long and the flight would be canceled.  We were all kicked off of the plane, and had to stand in another three hour long line to be rescheduled for the next available flight, which in our case was to Houston at 6:00AM.  At this point it was around 2:00 in the morning.  We had no luggage, no toothbrushes, and no place to stay.  Continental refused to give us any accommodation. They did provide airplane pillows and thin blankets.  We slept for two hours on the floor of the airport, and then headed to Houston at 6:00AM.  We arrived in Houston, lucked into an earlier flight on standby, and were SO happy to have FINALLY made it back to the Great State of Texas!  The only worry was our two little bags.  Where could they possibly be???? We went to the luggage office at DFW, and after telling us we would probably have to make a claim, an angel woman took a look and found them waiting patiently in the back!! YAY!! We were home, and Mom, Dad, Mason, Jordan, and Max were there to greet us and take us back to the house.  The Trip of a Lifetime had officially come to an end!  It was an amazing experience, and one we will NEVER forget.

Thanks for Reading,

Emily and Cody