Travel Diary

Monday morning came very fast!

In fact, when the alarm was going off, I really had no idea where I was or what bed I was in. I was really confused from all of the traveling the day before. However, I got ready fast, and prepared to call an Uber. It was disappointing that I set the alarm so late since it would've been nice to do a video and relax a little more in the morning, and maybe even use the coffee maker. But I pretty much had five minutes to get out the door because the flight was 7:30 AM, and it was already 6AM. I handed in my keys and noticed they even had the breakfast starting; however, I wasn't able to take advantage of that because I was leaving, and I would get fed on the plane anyway.

I summoned a Lyft and was a little worried, because was it was going to take 10 minutes to reach me and it was still 25 minutes to get to the airport, so time was a little short. I don't mind getting to some flights an hour before, but for JFK and the traffic around, it it is a bit risky having so little time to spare. But nothing could be changed at that point.

Finally, the driver did show up, and we headed over to the airport. He was pretty good about finding the best lane to be in, and traffic was never that bad but it was getting worse quickly. He offered to drop me off at the Arrivals instead of Departures, since he had said that earlier when he was there, it was really bad. But I think it was also the Terminal he was at. He was going to drop me off at Terminal 5, which is what Lyft told him, but I need to be at Terminal 7, so I mentioned that this wasn't the right terminal, and he apologized, and said he would take me to Terminal 7. That meant an extra 10 minutes of having to start at the entrance again and go around.

Okay, I was definitely getting concerned that point. He drop me off around 6:45am and I headed in quickly. Happily, the security line had virtually no one in it before me, so no time was wasted there. I was through in about two minutes, and then into the terminals with plenty of time to spare. In fact, when I got to the gate, I decided not to try to board early, even though I had about five minutes to go. I decided to wait again until everyone else was bordered, since I didn't need the overhead space, and it was nice not to be cramped in a plane for longer than necessary. Finally, the last person in line was getting on, so I got on too, and was soon in my seat: 3C this time. Oh, and one thing I noticed was a lady up in the first row who had booked two tickets, so she could bring her dog along with her, and that dog was quite large. Definitely not one of the small dogs that fit in little cage. This was full-size, perhaps a Dalmatian or something without the spots, but it was about that big. Soon we were in the air and heading towards Seattle.

While I did have a window seat, this time there was cloud cover for most of the trip, so I didn't get to take any photos of the ground. The flight attendant asked what drink I wanted, and I said I'd stick with water (I had done enough drinking the day prior). I was hesitant on the meal, but eventually decided to get the chicken sausage bowl which I think I had before and found it edible. But I was also dead tired from not sleeping much the night before (or the day before that!) so soon I was nodding off, and when the meals were delivered, she must've noticed I was asleep, and didn't serve my meal. They do that most of the time as to not disturb you. If you still want your meal when you wake up, you could always just ask for it and they will deliver it. For me I thought it probably was best that I pass on the meal, and just rest as much as possible, which is what I did.

I think I slept through most of the flight pretty well, and soon, we were getting ready for the descent. One thing I have noticed is that the descent into Seattle always seems to start very early, because even after everything is prepared and we're starting our descent, it is still probably another 30 minutes before we actually land. Maybe that's due to the weather patterns around the area, or something else. I don't know, but I have noticed it.

We touched down and had quite a long wait on the tarmac because we had landed early. I find that every time a flight lands 15 to 20 minutes early, you still have to wait on the tarmac because the gates aren't ready. Thus, it doesn't really help that much to arrive early. Once we did park and disembark, I hurried off to walk over to the parking garage, where I headed left to the lake trains, even though I found Uber was only going to be about $45—which was actually a pretty good deal.

But I was wondering how much cheaper it would be at Tukwila station, or perhaps I could just pay the three dollars and take Link the entire way, which would've been three times longer, but much cheaper. Yeah, lots of decisions to make for the 18-mile journey into the city.

I got on link and did buy my ticket (it’s stealing otherwise) and when we started getting close to Tukwila I checked Uber it was only gonna be slightly cheaper (around $38), so it wasn't worth it at that point, and I kept going. I checked the prices at a few more stations, but the Uber prices were not dropping by much--and Lyft was still way over priced so that wasn't even an option at all. It didn’t matter much as I was engrossed in my phone, playing with a language learning app, so I didn't mind the time. Eventually, we arrived at Capital Hill Station.

I got out, walked home, and promptly fell fast asleep.