We'll be comin' on the airplane when we come...

The kids are off school for nearly three weeks for Christmas, and our deal with Helac includes airfare twice a year, so we headed home for the holidays! Yahoo! We were all counting the days. We are always excited to head to Canada for Christmas, and we always have lots to do and prepare, but loading up the van is a bit different from packing suitcases for a trip to the other side of the world. We tried to take as little as possible and nest our suitcases so on the way home we could bring as much as possible. We only had 7 suitcases but that was still too many for inside the Innova so on the roof they went. We didn't have any warm clothes here in India anyway, so that helped. We had been making a list on the fridge for 5 months of stuff we wanted to bring back with us. I had left winter clothes, ski pants, coats etc and (I thought) the stockings in Pincher Creek at Mom and Dad's so we would be all prepared. Turns out, altho I may have taken the stockings there, we never did see them :(. Anyway, the flight leaves in the middle of the night, so we were way early at the airport, but that was good, since they changed the gate and nobody announced it, and we stood in a line for 20 minutes before someone came along to tell us that altho there are no signs to indicate, it was the first class queue so we needed to be somewhere else, etc etc. I wish I could show pictues of the airport - I think you can't take any, but you wouldn't believe it. It is so not modern. Low ceilings, no restaurants or bank machines, no signage, very prinmitive security (Xray your checked bags here, then get them back and walk around for while then they will Xray your carry-on -and of course, yoiu have already moved the drugs and weapons to your other bag in the meantime- and if they are ok we mark them with a tiny sticker and we zip-tie some of the pockets, but not all - you get the idea), lousy facilities for screening (everybody packs into a hallway to remove their shoes, get wanded, patted down, bags searched and re-shoed while others try to get past you down the narrow hall) very little seating, etc etc. NOT what you expect from an international airport. Anyway, stand here, move there, wait here, sit there, stand here some more and then we were on the plane. It is a LOOOOOOOOOONG flight direct to Chicago - about 15 hours. They like to put us in one long row, since I guess it is preferable to climb over ones family members than strangers when you have to go potty, but we hate it. Everytime we ask for window and aisle and everytime we get the long row in the middle. And there is 5 seats, so Randy sat across the aisle. And I sat amongst the kids. Is he slipping them a fiver to make that happen?? Anyway, we were tired so we all slept a long time, arrived in Chicago to discover delightedly that you can drink DIRECTLY from the water fountains (oh joy!!) and ALL the toilets have seats (no squatters!) and McDonalds serves BEEF in their burgers (we'll take 8 cheeseburgers please), there were wreaths and Christmas trees to look at, and (in the immortal words of Isaac Leavitt) "we have our camoflauge on here" when he noticed that it was harder to find his family among all the white faces waiting for flights! Isaac was the most vocal in expressing happiness to be in North America - he spontaneoulsy burst into My Country Tis of Thee in the bathroom :) but it was relaxing to be where things were familiar. The airport is huge, of course, and had some really cool lights in the big underground walkway - Sam took photos.
We changed to a smaller plane for the trip to Calgary (we got to walk across the tarmack - I love that!!) and sat in pairs all over the plane. In Chicago we had realized that Randy's blackberry didn't work, so we couldn't call to say flights were on time. We were not sure what would happen in Calgary, but when we walked out of customs we immediately spotted Dad, and Aunt Dora and Uncle Bill! Dad had just made it there, because on the way, he stopped for gas in Claresholm and didn't have a wallet, so he had to wash a lot of dishes to get out of there :) No, but he did have to wait for someone to bring his wallet from PC. Aunt Dora got quite a bit of mileage out of that story :). It's fun when your little brother loses his marbles first, I guess. Anyway, Randy had dreamed of a Peter's burger for about 3 months, so we loaded up and headed directly to Peter's. It was a nice day, but still a bit nippy for eating outside, especially when you don't have a coat! We were saved when Bonnie and Janae showed up, with coats, to eat lunch, and to take us and our luggage, which certainly wouldn't fit in one minivan. Afterwards, the girls went to Ikea (aaaah, the promised land) and the men went to a tool place (aaaah, the promised land) then to Pincher Creek.
Stay tuned for the return trip! (with 24 pieces of luggage....)




This is Calgary from the Deerfoot Trail. Look at the blue sky. And hardly any trash on the roadside. And barely any smog. Aaaaaah, home.