Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Despite the fact that we were taking less luggage than on any previous trip and that we had been packing and preparing for the better part of a week, the England, Ireland, Scotland voyage got off to a decidedly rough start.

I opted to take the entire day off rather than work in the AM and made the last minute decision that we needed a new Jan Sport bag for my camera. (Long story short, Travis was going to use GlowsMagic's Jan Sport until we discovered that it reeked of Bath & Body Works lotion. No doubt from GlowsMagic's obsession with the stuff. Seeking as we didn't want our clothes and other personal belongings to also reek, we opted to buy a new bag.) Trouble was, outside of back to school season, Jan Sports apparently aren't stocked on a regular basis in high numbers.

So, after running around the greater Clearwater area for the majority of the morning and having no Jan Sport for the effort, I sent a text to Travis to inform him he would have to run by Countryside Mall and purchase one we had seen a couple days before. At the time we were unsure of the color and wanted to look around. Would have saved a world of trouble just to buy it then.

Returning home I finished printing out hotel information, boarding passes, and the like and then started on the final items to be packed. Generally the weight of our carry on bags is of little issue since the legacy airlines, and most airlines in general, provide for generous weight allowances. Unless one is carrying a substantial number of cement cinder blocks onto the plane you're more than likely good. This trip, however, would prove different.

Our flights between the three countries were booked with Ryanair and EasyJet. The well-known, low-cost, and ultra bare bone airlines allow only one item of carry on (versus the one carry on and one personal item of most airlines) and restrictive weight allowances (Ryanair 10kg, EasyJet 20kg).

On travel morning, re-weighing our bags revealed that they probably wouldn't fly with Ryanair. So, we began to make concessions on what not to take: Zoom and micro lenses, the new netbook, etc., etc. Finally, after much frustration and hassle, we felt the weight would meet allowable levels. Zipped the bags, threw them in GlowsMagic's car, and headed off to TIA.

Traffic was fine though the ever-shifting I-275 connector and the TIA entrance gave GlowsMagic a bit of nerve shock. Arriving at the drop off curb we grabbed the bags and headed inside to check in. The airlines cost-saving efforts of moving to self serve check in kiosks is quite brilliant. Generally much more efficient for those who travel a bit as when there's no representative to be assailed by a barrage of questions by the individual in front of you things tend to move at a much better clip.

With boarding passes in hand (Continental wouldn't allow the passes to be pre-printed at home as it was an international flight) we headed to Airside A. Tampa International Airport has rolled out a three tier, "Self Select" security check point system approved by the TSA whereby passengers are asked to select the security line that is most fitting: Expert Traveler (those who know, without reminders, to remove belts, footwear, liquids, and travel light), Casual Traveler (those with multiple carry-ons and some knowledge of what's expected of them), and Family/Medical Liquid Travelers (those who have no clue what's expected of them, have children to be delt with, or who need medical liquids examined).

My first experience with this new system is that it is ingenious. There was one individual in front of us in the line and he was through in 20 seconds. We were through in probably the same amount of time with not a word from the TSA agent managing the line. The other two lines were significantly longer.

Once through security we checked the departure board and noted our flight out of TPA to Newark was already delayed. Presumably due to weather in Newark. Since neither of us had eaten and it was nearing noon we found a table at the Jose Cuervo Tequileria and settled in for some lunch and the wait for our plane.

As airport food goes the restaurant was adequate and we enjoyed the cheese quesadilla and vegetarian nachos along with a mandatory Sam Adams Lager. (Given that our stock investment in the Boston Beer Co. has nose-dived to about half the original purchase value, well, we figure someone has to attempt to help the company out.)

Throughout the meal and for the time afterward Continental kept updating our flight departure time. We ended up being delayed until 5:15 or so and were thankful that our layover in Newark provided us with enough cushion that we wouldn't miss our connection to Dublin.

The flight was generally unremarkable aside from our seat neighbor who decided, without any requests put forth to us, to re-arrange seat assignments and take the window seat. The plane was arranged 3x3 (three seats, aisle, three seats) so we purposefully booked the window seat and the aisle seat in the hopes that no one would select the middle seat and we would end up with it vacant. (We figured if someone did book the seat we would simply ask them to switch with one of us anyway.) At any rate, we were happy to have the middle and aisle seats though the flight attendants did seem confused when our pre-ordered vegetarian meals came to the woman in the window seat named Travis. Aside from her seat-switch and her ongoing migraine she was a fine seat neighbor to have.

As is generally not the case for us, our arrival and departure flights surprisingly were located in the same terminal at Newark. Though, of course, at opposite ends. We were soon seated at our departure gate and awaiting our boarding time.

During our layover we busied ourselves with an update on the cats from GlosMagic, a quick trip around the terminal, and watching the arrival of what seemed to be a large rugby contingent from some high school. Before long we had boarded the plane and were on our way to Dublin.

More coming very soon!

Thanks to our newly acquired Acer Aspire One Netbook I'll be either Tumblr'ing, blogging, or some combination of the two, during the upcoming trip to the Republic of Ireland, England, and Scotland.

With the trip now a mere 31 days away I'm happy to report that progress has been made on the hotel bookings and general trip planning. Though the rule remains that he who chooses the destination does the trip planning it seems Travis suffered a bit of amnesia and left the planning to me for this round. (Seems to follow the pattern for Thailand and Peru, not to mention the upcoming Down Under tour.)

At any rate, the netbook is tiny (nearly the size of a travel book as the picture shows), light weight, and should easily slide into the carry on. It's far from being a top tier notebook but we have one of those and decided it's far too heavy to travel with after lugging it around Switzerland.

More England, Ireland, Scotland updates coming soon.