Nothing can go wrong” said John and we believed him. Everything had been arranged by Debbie who is an expert organiser, it looked like the threat of war by Tony Blair and George ‘Dub’ya’ Bush had been put on hold and after all, we were only going for 9 days. We’d even avoided travelling with KLM who had managed to lose our luggage twice on our last trip to the US. No, we were convinced - nothing could go wrong.
Our journey started at 06.30 on Thursday September 19th, 2002 with a drive down to Edinburgh. We left the car there and boarded a City Jet for Paris and apart from the flight leaving 30 minutes late, it was uneventful, took about an hour and a half and we had a nice breakfast. We had very little time in Charles de Gaulle airport as the Air France flight boarded early but for some reason, it then took off an hour late. I had been disappointed to learn that we were not seated at the window but in the event, we had bulkhead seats in the middle with just the two of us in a row of three and lots of leg room so maybe it wasn’t going to be so bad after all. It was about an 9-hour flight so I thought we may even be able to get some sleep but some huge American bloke saw there was an empty seat next to me and decided it had more leg room than where he was sitting so he would move. This was a BIG man – not fat but about 6’6” and broad and his feet were the biggest I’ve ever seen. He sat down and put his arms on the rest between us, Gordon was on the other side with his arm on the other rest and there was I in the middle squashed up like a sardine. I changed my mind about the likelihood of getting any rest. Anyway, the flight passed without any further hitches and both Gordon and I agreed that Air France do lovely food.
We landed in Atlanta eventually and it looked like a lovely airport but we didn’t have much time to see it. The flight to New Orleans was also boarding early so we got on and this time I had a window seat which was good as it was still light. Atlanta is 6 hours behind us and we were supposed to leave at 1850 their time (10 to 1 in the morning by our body clocks) but then once on, the plane didn’t move. Eventually, the Captain told us that something had broken down – the thing that warns them of bad weather – and he wasn’t prepared to fly without it but no matter, they were going to get another part, fit it and then we’d be off. Wrong! They put the new part in, it didn’t work, they tried something else which also didn’t work and then after we had sat on the runway for an hour and a half, they said we all had to “de-plane” as they put it – (how American) The airport lounge was in chaos, as you can imagine, but we were too tired to make a fuss so we called John & Debbie who were waiting for us in New Orleans airport, told them that we’d get a cab and meet them at the B&B place and sat down to wait for another plane.
It didn’t actually take too long before they found us one – this was Delta Airlines, and eventually at 10 p.m. their time, 4 a.m. ours, we took off. No point in having a window seat now – it was dark!! The flight to New Orleans took only 1 hour and 7 minutes and we arrived at 10 p.m. their time as they are an hour behind Atlanta. Can you believe that at this hour it was 84° ???
We landed in Atlanta eventually and it looked like a lovely airport but we didn’t have much time to see it. The flight to New Orleans was also boarding early so we got on and this time I had a window seat which was good as it was still light. Atlanta is 6 hours behind us and we were supposed to leave at 1850 their time (10 to 1 in the morning by our body clocks) but then once on, the plane didn’t move. Eventually, the Captain told us that something had broken down – the thing that warns them of bad weather – and he wasn’t prepared to fly without it but no matter, they were going to get another part, fit it and then we’d be off. Wrong! They put the new part in, it didn’t work, they tried something else which also didn’t work and then after we had sat on the runway for an hour and a half, they said we all had to “de-plane” as they put it – (how American) The airport lounge was in chaos, as you can imagine, but we were too tired to make a fuss so we called John & Debbie who were waiting for us in New Orleans airport, told them that we’d get a cab and meet them at the B&B place and sat down to wait for another plane.
It didn’t actually take too long before they found us one – this was Delta Airlines, and eventually at 10 p.m. their time, 4 a.m. ours, we took off. No point in having a window seat now – it was dark!! The flight to New Orleans took only 1 hour and 7 minutes and we arrived at 10 p.m. their time as they are an hour behind Atlanta. Can you believe that at this hour it was 84° ???
Anyway, we found a cab no bother, got to “La Belle Reve”, the B&B in the Garden District of New Orleans where we were staying and met up again with John & Debs. The house was fabulous in Queen Anne/Victorian style (built 1892) with wooden floors throughout and a veranda to play the Southern Belle on.
There were only 2 guest rooms but each had its own bathroom and we had a huge 4-poster feather bed – it even had steps up to help you get in it – and it wasn’t long before we did!!
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