Day 9 and 10

Day 9 started out early as the kids were awoken at 3:00 am in order to make our way to Amsterdam International for out flight to Munich. This will not be our first venture into Germany as our tour of Groesbeek, which is located along the Nederland and German border,
drifted into the country for about 15 minutes. I kind of thought that our second stay wouldn't be much longer. Yeah right!

After winding our way through the airport in a hurried manner because we have only a few minutes between connecting flights to Toronto, we pass through customs and arrive unscathed in terminal 2 gate H 24, location of flight 847 to Toronto with Air Canada.

Not much later we noticed that the flight had been slightly delayed, thus the ephone calls home started and o began to chat with EF and their toronto office to coordinate pick up for hotel, room reservation, and our wonderful Greek meal at the hotel.......ummmm can't wait.

Well the delay became a full cancellation and the cancellation turned into airport shut down. As that occurred a lineup began at the Lufthansa air desk which in all honesty had about 2000 people in it, maybe more I just know the last people in line were there for about 8- 10 hours. More phone calls home, a few tears and a few complaints but all of that has to be ignored at this point from my end. Marilyn and Kelly are in line and I have a phone attached to my ear.

EF has always been very helpful and prior to leaving I had discussed any and all provisions about the event of a delay because the wonderful Eklyhsttymndgsic volcano( I can't spell that darn thing so that will be my only attempt). After a number of conversations with Amy at EF, she assured me that they were working toward securing a hotel in the area. Realistically, with about 10,000 people needing hotel rooms in the Munich area, this is not going to be simple.

By this point I think all of you know what a logistic nightmare this is, but I can reassure you that we are making the best of it and right now I am glad that Bruins are not playing tonight. Although we left the Westisle group at Amsterdam as the were flying to Ottawa via
Frankfurt, at this point we are unsure of what situation they are in as well. In Munich however, we are not the only ones in this predicament, Uxbridge high school in Whitby, Ontario is so stuck
here. They were actually split from their group the night before and although the other parts of the group are reportedly on Canadian soil, Carolyn Allen and her students have worst luck than us it seems.

From this point I ask Carolyn if she would like me to coordinate everything from the EF end so she can spell the ladies off in the line from time to time.

The kids were actually having a great time, Sam was dancing and singing for everyone, a bunch were playing cards either UNO or crazy eights (personally I would have liked seeing poker game break out, but then again I shouldn't be gambling with the kids!) and usual the Forbes duo
of Neil and Barb are fast asleep. I have been teasing Neil all week that it would have been cheaper to stay on the island and sleep all week, then again he wouldn't have gotten 15 hours sleep a day if he'd have stayed home!

Finally we have a breakthrough with regards to accommodations, in consultation with the airport and they have agreed to provide cots as well as some overnight bags for the kids to use. Hotel Munich Airport terminal 2 gate H it is.

I realize you may rather your kids have stayed in a hotel tonight, but after finally getting a hotel about an hour from the city combined with the fact that it would take about 45 minutes or more to get our luggage and get out of the airport, we wouldn't reach the hotel until close to 11 PM. Since we need to be back at 5 AM with an hour travel time, it would be ridiculous to leave for about 4 hours. In any event this is the decision and the kids are ok with it. Teachers will also
be doing 2 hour shifts throughout the night to make sure the kids feel safe, etc.

With everything going on has been going on, the subject of food has been on the backburner. The kids have eaten a little because the airport has given out plenty of sandwiches, drinks and fruit throughout the day. Since we haven't really incurred any extra expenses for EF to this point, I have informed them I will be ordering supper for all 42 of us(Ontario included). We found a restaurant that can accommodate everyone and provide the kids with French fries, pasta and some chicken. Everyone filled themselves silly and I paid the bill.........$610.00 Euros, by
far the biggest meal ticket I have ever sprung for. Thank god for EF's expense account and I guarantee we are not done yet on that expense account.

The sleep was actually one of the best they have gotten all week, In bed at 10:30 and most slept right until the wake up time at 6:00 am. Now back to gate 24.

Kent and I had checked the flight situation early in the am and things are a go!!!! Let's keep are fingers crossed! The kids are situated at the gate so Marilyn jumped in line for the new boarding passes and then flight delayed......arrrghhh...... Oh well, if there is one thing that I have learned in the last few years about travelling is the fact that most things are out of your control. If you get yourself to the gate on time, you have done your job and then it is out of your hands.

As a few minutes go by and we have the kids in place, I take half of the passports from Marilyn and attempt to get us new boarding passes to alleviate some stress from her. After a few minutes of great conversation with a the booking attendant I find out that the flight is delayed again from 7:45 to 8:26, if all goes well. After a few more minutes boarding begins and you can finally see a few more smiling faces, but without makeup I am not sure I know who most of these people are! As boarding begins life is good again......That is until we sit on the runway for 2 hours…….. life back to normal again!

Finally take off and the captain tells us of a more northern route over Norway and Greenland to avoid the volcanic ash. This should put us in Toronto in approximately 9 hours or 4 movies (which thus far have been Invictus and now Percy Jackson's The Lightning Thief...... Next up a Hangover, no I am not drinking on the flight although I deserve a couple, I was talking about the movie Hangover.)

After a quick snooze and check on the kids after 7 hours of flying all seems to be going well. Although we are less than two hours from Toronto we are about the same distance from the island. The normal route would take us almost right over the top of home, but because of
the ash cloud and our more northerly route over Greenland of all places, we are currently over Labrador instead of the island.

A few are asleep, many more still watching the plethora of movies available (I am into the classic Wedding Crashers right now) but the bottom line they are all dealing with the rigors of international travel, and doing it “exceedingly well.” When we hit Toronto we will have another long wait as the connecting flight doesn't leave until after 8 PM tonight(est). With that in mind, we should be arriving back in Charlottetown around 11 PM tonight....... More details to follow. Back to my movie!

We have finally arrived don Canadian soil and we are all extremely happy about that. The luggage will a great sight to see as we all want to simply change, throw on some deodorant, and just feel a little more fresh( they all stink, I am as fresh as a daisy but the rest of the group smell like a pack wild dogs left outside for days!!!).

Around and around and around and around goes the carousel….it gets boring what a steel carousel going around with nothing on it…the adventure continues on and so much for the change of clothes! Unfortunately, only 3 of our group received their luggage, but this was the same with most of the other passengers on the flight.

Although we were tired and cranky and stinky, we tried to get everyone to stay positive. I would rather be in Canada closer to home and a little stinky than in a German airport at this point. Air Canada has said that they expect most of our luggage to be on the next flight from Munich, around 6:00 PM(EST). Let’s keep our fingers crossed again, at this point we may as well permanently super glue them together in this position!!!

We shuffled the kids out of the baggage claim area and on to customs and we are all happy to see the smiling faces of the Canadian customs officials at immigration. Many of the kids were kind of nervous about the claims forms they filled out, and once again we tried to reassure them that they would be fine. Everyone passed through unscathed and we were now officially allowed back into our own country.

After talking to a few people on PEI(Sorry about the lack of updates, but when we left it was only 2 AM and figured we would wait until you got up and we arrived in T-dot!), I treated everyone to lunch once again. We didn’t quite ring up the same bill as in Munich, but the bill still came to over $500.00, but we were stuffed Canadians on Canadian soil, so who cares!!!(and once again this was on EF’s bill anyways!!!!)

They final leg of the journey is now upon us and yes you guessed it we are delayed again. This time only about 15 minutes, in our experience that is nothing at all. For myself I am torn, do I get on the plane and go home or pretend to not know how to tell time and miss the flight and watch the Bruins game from a bar. The Bruins are important but I really need to get home and see my family and of course our new addition, Bruin!!!

Thankfully we left right on time(after the delay of course) and most of us, although anxious to see all of you, slept the entire way home. As Shannon and I exited the plane and were able to see many smiling faces(familiar ones for a change as well!) and it once again gave me a sense of accomplishment. These experiences are an important part of your children and this very important to me. It takes a lot of effort from all kinds of people to carry out all that is necessary to get this project off the ground and successful.

I would like to close with a few "thank yous". First I would like to thank my teacher and adult travel partners for all of the work and effort you have put into making the experience on PEI and in Europe a complete success. I would also like to thank the people from EF tours, specifically Mary Erskine and our tour director David Harrod for all of their “groundwork” with the trip. Without them, the trip would never have taken place. To Dave Robinson, who is the driving force behind all of these tours, you are an exemplary educator and individual with the best interests of students and veterans in mind at all times!!

I would especially like to thank you, the parents and guardians, for reading my blog and also for trusting us with your most prized possessions halfway around the world. It must not be easy and because of my love of travel, I am sure Mya and Max will be asking to do this sort of thing when they reach high school….I truly hope that they have the opportunity to experience something like this in a few years. Lastly, I would like to thank the students. It is obvious they are a key cog in this World Tour machine and without their enthusiasm and cooperation on the log journey it would never be possible. I really think that the journey will become even more meaningful for you as you age and especially when the last WWII vet passes away. When that happens it will be up to you to remember and recount the stories of what these men and women have done for our country and countries abroad. The torch has been passed……hold it high and be proud to be a Canadian!!!!

dc(dead-tired, delighted to be home chizzy)