A big thing happened while I was away from here.
Huge.
Exciting.
Something we've been planning for more than a year.
We went to Scotland.
Just Jason and me.
It was amazing.
A student asked me if I'd like to go back, and I said, "If I had the money, I'd go in a heartbeat."
And he said, "I like how money is your first thought, and not the responsibilities you have at home like your kids and your job." And then I punched him in the nose and drop kicked him out the door.
Not really. (You figured that, huh?)
He was just teasing me anyway, so no big deal. But really, if we had the money, we'd go again. The grandparents stepped up and took care of the girls--Jason's mom did the lion's share of the work by staying out our house with the girls and keeping them fed and clothed--and Jason was on spring break so the work thing and the house thing and the taking care of the kids thing was all good. Because my spring break was the week before we left, I did cancel my classes for the week that I was gone, but I had worked it out all ahead of time, so it was good too.
Anyway! Those the logistics of how people like us go do crazy things like travel to a foreign country for a week.
So, Saturday, March 31st, we flew from Portland to Seattle and then to Iceland. Then we were supposed to fly from Iceland to Glasgow and arrive there Sunday morning. However, our plane in Seattle broke, so we had to wait around for a plane to arrive from Iceland, and even though I am a good and easy traveler who does not fret about flying, I admit that eventually this plane breaking down business had me sobbing in front of some Icelandic woman who really wished she had taken that day off from work.
But before that drama, we had this drama.
And by drama, I mean dramatic.
And by dramatic, I mean awesome amazingness of flying over the top of the world and seeing the sun rise.
I got very little sleep on the plane because I was excited, and because I was reading "Hunger Games" over Jason's shoulder (I didn't start until half way through, so I know the end, but haven't actually read the whole book). But I did doze off a little bit.
And when I woke up, we were hitting the Icelandic coastline.
(all these pictures are with my iPhone because I packed my point-and-shoot in my luggage)
Because of our delay and because the Iceland airport evidently doesn't have any flights off the island after 9 am, we discovered upon our arrival that we would not be going to Scotland that day. We--and about 60 others from our flight--would be hanging out in Iceland for the day and evening (our hotel and meals courtesy of IcelandAir).
Though I was bummed, I had a good attitude. When would we ever have a chance to visit Iceland? Never. How fun could this be? Very.
So we made the best of it and spent Sunday hanging out in Reyjavik thinking that we'd be catching the early morning flight to Glasgow the next morning and I'd be giving my sister a big ole' hug by 10:30 am.
Little did we know: IcelandAir does not fly directly from Iceland to Scotland on Mondays. There would be no 10:30 am hugging of my sister. There would instead be lots of tears.
...to be continued...
