Got up this morning, already concerned about how things were going to go today.
Schools announced closed. After Amanda IMs me, I start watching the news. Looks grim.
Margie gets up around 7:30. “Let’s head to the airport.”
Okay … we have two options here. We can try to get through to Frontier to see if we should even bother (“Average wait time for the next available agent is … sixty … minutes …”), or we can drive to the airport before the roads get too bad and see if they can get us on an early morning flight to LA … San Diego … San Francisco … Las Vegas … somewhere we can either get picked up from or get a plane down to OC.
The drive in was mildly hairy. The roads were beginning to get covered, but there was still a lot of pavement visible, especially as the high winds blew the snow away. Averaged about 40 mph on the highway getting to the airport.
All lots were open. Margie gave me sheltered parking for Christmas. 🙂
Got inside. Massive, lengthy, horrifically long line at Frontier. Rumors of all flights being canceled, Pena Blvd. being closed, mass hysteria …
Got in line. Margie suggested I go down to baggage claim, find the display with alll the local hotels with shuttle service, and book us a room for a couple of nights in case we get snowed in there. After several tries, finally found the Doubletree, over on Quebec, had a room.
Upstairs the line was moving pretty decently (and growing by leaps and bounds). Went to the Seattle’s Best and picked up coffee and cider.
Got back in line. Stepped out of line to hop onto a business call i was scheduled for. Cell traffic and reception was more awful than usual, no doubt because every other person I saw was talking with someone on the cell phone (most of which was along the lines of “… canceled … trapped … doomed …”). Looked out the windows at the progressively worse weather.
We kept sliding forward … and were just about to enter the (very full) switchback lines, when a Frontier rep came out and basically said (a) all flights today were canceled (duh, we could see the signs), (b) the counter folks were working with individuals to rebook them elsewhere, but it was taking a lot of time, and (c) Pena Blvd. (the main arterial out of the airport) wasn’t closed but could close soon, and was already highly congested. So her suggestion was that folks go home (who could) and try to
get hold of Frontier by phone.
Yeah. We decided probably as good an idea as any.
So we schlepped back to the car. Katherine was pretty upset over not going to California today, but we promised her we’d get there before Christmas.
The plan was to see how the airport drive and Pena Blvd were, snow-wise. If too awful, we’d go to the Doubletree and camp out there. If okay, we’d try to make it home.
The cashier at the parking booth told us that Pena was already closed.
Traffic out of the airport was awful, but once we got on E470, things were fairly clear. The quality of the roadway varried — a few windswept passages, some areas were there was good ruts, other areas that were pretty bad, and a few mile where we were behind a snowplow.
Took us about two hours to make the normally 45 minutes-tops trip, averaging 20-40 mph, but we made it — unlike a few others, about whom we developed the Safety Mantra: “Don’t be that guy.”
Meanwhile, Jackie was supposed to be house sitting for us, but she had gone into the office today like a lunatic (and because she was supposed to look after a cat at a co-worker’s house up there). Margie had encouraged her to come down to the house this morning as we left, figuring it would be a better place to be snowed in. She ended up coming down C470 while we were traversing E470, got to the house a short bit before we did … and, knowing we were coming home (the miracle of the cell phone is that
everyone who needed to knew our status) started shoveling the driveway. Wow.
She was about half done by the time we got home, and that let us get the Subaru (a fine, fine, fine, excellent snow vehicle, QED) up into the garage. So Jackie gets to be snowed in with us.
So … now what?
- Cancel the hotel.
- Contact Frontier to see if they can rebook us on Friday.
- If they can’t, plan on driving to SoCal (the southern route, via New Mexico) on Friday — arrive early Saturday morning in the wee hours (assuming we don’t hotel around Flagstaff) and be there.
Sounds like a plan.
Meantime, most unfairly, I have to work today and tomorrow. Yikes!
Mad props to Margie for keeping us organized and in good spirits. She might even be on the Channel 4 news this evening, as she had a nice chat with a camera man there to check out the Long Lines at the Airport.
Mad props also to Katherine for being a Very Good Girl under trying circumstances. She kept herself pretty well entertained.
Dude, your post may prove invaluable – I’ve got a traveler stranded out at DIA crying on the phone to one of the other res agents here at Travel Deranger Central. She’s going to call the Doubletree now and see if they still have any rooms left. You did remember to cancel that room, didn’t you?
Margie got #1-2 completed. We’re booked for a Friday evening flight. Assuming the blizzard doesn’t run longer, and they can get stuff cleaned up in 24-plus hours, we should be golden. Yay!
Yup — room canceled.
Offer my condolences — we’d be much worse off if we didn’t live in the area (and/or if we hadn’t left when we did). Th weather outside really *does* look frightful — lots of wind blowing snow in all directions.
The footage they showed on CNN earlier looked pretty bad. Stay cozy and try to enjoy yourselves.
Glad to hear that you’re all okay, if not in the place you’d hoped to be.
In my family, when travel situations become “changed due to circustances beyond one’s control” that’s when travel becomes an “adventure.” I’ve had adventures in Angel’s Camp, CA (water pump), State Line, NV (also a water pump, but I don’t remember cause I was just a baby), Grapevine and Bakersfield, CA (fuel filter-Dave, you should remember this), St. George, UT (no a/c in summer to cross desert), and two adventures on the great trip to Salt Lake with Margie (largest snow storm in 40 years in Southern NV, on the outward bound trip and no first or second gear while driving home). And those are just the fun “adventures.”
I believe my father’s theory was that having an adventure made things “memorable” rather than “deplorable.”
Good luck and godspeed.
Holee cow!
Still wanna get rid o’ that Subaru?
The BBC was out taking pictures
Are you kidding? This has only reinforced our intent to get another one. 🙂
Mah Goodness! Glad you’re safe and sound. And I hope things melt or get cleaned up enough that you can get out without too many problems on Friday!
I suspect, by Friday mid-day, we should be okay to head to the airport. Biggest issue will be getting up our street. Jackie’s offered to help with her somewhat-higher-wheelbase-than-the-Subaru 4Runner. We’ll see.