When I named the blog “Alaskan Adventures” I didn’t know that we would be having a little bit different adventure than we had planned. After enjoying our artichoke dip and drink at the airport restaurant we headed toward the gate. Dad was able to check his carry on bag, but as he was doing that I heard a gentleman talking about how our he received notice that our flight out of Des Moines had been delayed. I quickly got on the website and saw that it was delayed and we wouldn’t arrive into Chicago until the time our flight was scheduled to depart. We knew the short layover in Chicago was going to be a challenge, but we didn’t think Des Moines is where we would run into issues. As I was looking this up the captain of the plane came out and stated that there were hydrolic issues and they had to call in a special mechanical crew. He was unsure of how long it would be but stated the flight would be a “rolling delay” meaning it was delayed indefinitely.
Dad got in line for the gate agent while I started looking up other options. We needed to get to Anchorage by tomorrow morning so we could catch our 5:50am flight to Prudhoe Bay. If we missed that flight there isn’t another flight until Monday. The line wasn’t moving and I wasn’t finding anything online so we stepped out of line, found the departure board and called Alaskan Airlines. We tried every where- what if we went to Minneapolis? Drove to Kansas City? There was another flight to Chicago-could we get another flight to Anchorage? Nothing.
While we were on hold for quite awhile we went back to the gate where we got back in line. Dad was able to speak with the gate agent before the airlines customer service came back. There was no way to get us to Anchorage to get on the 5:50am flight to Prudhoe Bay. Our best option was to get to Anchorage at 8:30am. So, we took it and had a change of plans.
We have canceled our Prudhoe Bay flight and rented a truck; we will be driving about 20 hours from Anchorage to Prudhoe Bay. There are definite pros and cons to this change. Pro- We get to fly from Seattle to Anchorage over the glaciers in the daylight now. We get to stop in Denali. We will get to stop as we please along the way up the Dalton Highway. Cons- about a day and half less in Prudhoe Bay.
Our Dallas flight out of Des Moines went well. It was a shorter flight and our seats were placed in the exit row so we had a lot of leg room. We were able to find our gate in Dallas with ease. The transportation system from one terminal to the next was slick. Our flight in Dallas was delayed about an hour. The only thing open was a TGIFridays so I got a sandwich to go while we waited for our flight. When we were placed on the flight our seats weren’t together so we asked the gate agent if she had any available eats together. She was able to get us in the back row which they typically reserve for the flight attendants in case of turbulence or a medical emergency. There wasn’t a third person in our row so we were able to spread out a little. Both of us slept on the flight, but boy was it cold on the airplane!
We made it to Seattle about 2:15am Seattle time. Our goal was to find a place to be able to rest for a little bit during our layover. We found some seats without armrests and called it home for a couple hours. I slept for about 30 minutes; apparently 3:30am is cleaning time.
When we were both awake we decided to get some breakfast from a coffee stand and call Mom and Thom. We got to FaceTime with Rocky for a couple minutes. Our flight leaves in about an hour and we’ll be on our way to Anchorage!
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