Summer Vacation

I can't believe I have not updated this blog since April 24th! Yikes. Since then Ryan "graduated" from Elementary School and will be a 6th grader at Middle School this fall. Hard to believe. This was the first summer that I was off all summer with the kids and it has been great, but the time is going by too fast. Kendra and Ryan have been doing some sports summer camps at the local high school We are now on a 3 week vacation to Alaska and then Washington/Oregon before we head back to get ready for the first day of school.

I want to use this blog to journal our vacation. Yesterday did not go too well. We left Austin on Southwest (free rapid reward tickets), our flight left at 3:20 pm and we were on the same plane to Seattle and in the middle of the flight we were to land in Denver and let passengers off and on. Well, I was worried about getting out of Texas before the bad weather came to Austin as a result of Hurricane Dolly that I didn't think to look at the weather around the states. Due to a bad thunderstorm in Denver we had to land to Amarillo for awhile. The plane refueled and restocked supplies. Initially we were scheduled to land at 6:45pm pacific time and we landed at 9:05 pm. We were on the same plane for almost 8 hours! Our flight on Alaska Airlines was scheduled to leave at 9:45 pm. Needless to say we did not make our connecting flight. It was after 10:00 Seattle time, midnight Austin time, when we tried to get a hotel room for the night. An Alaska Airlines agent gave me a flier with an 800 number on it to get a hotel room at a discounted price due to my missing the flight. I found out that the rooms in Seattle were booked due to a big Seattle Mariners game and a festival going on in Seattle this weekend. I finally found a room at a EconoLodge that was not too far from here. I was happy to get a room that was close and not a smoking room, but my heart sank when we got to the hotel. It was a part motel/hotel and there was a police car at one of the rooms. We checked into our room and when we opened the door, you could hear the "cheep-cheep" on the smoke alarm as it needed a new battery. We had to gather our luggage to the small elevator and go downstairs again to get a different room. It was almost midnight and we had not eaten dinner but we were soo tired we went strait to bed. This was the worst hotel room I have stayed in and felt sorry for the kids. We didn't get a good night sleep, maybe 5-6 hours, so were anxious to get the to airport this morning. I am at the airport and we are at our gate waiting to get seats together on the next flight. We cannot wait to see our family in Fairbanks! I will report often and hopefully down load some beautiful pictures in Alaska.