We should have known things weren’t going to go smoothly. We were unable to check-in at the automated kiosks in the Los Cabos airport. The message told us to seek help at the WestJet counter, however, it wasn’t open. It didn’t open for about an hour after we got that message, which was less than two hours before we were supposed to leave. So much for getting to the airport at least two hours before an international flight. As it turned out though, the incoming plane was late, due to de-icing in Calgary, so it was more than two hours, but I digress.
When the WestJet staff finally got the computers working we checked in, got our luggage tagged and got on the escalator to go through security. The lady in front of us fumbled to find her travel documents at the checkpoint just before security. She had several bags and she dropped them so she could go through them. We had our documents in hand so we showed them to the official and went around the fumbling lady. She was still there when we were gathering up our belongings after clearing security.
We took our time going through the duty-free shop but didn’t find anything we had to have. We went to our gate, found two seats and settled in to wait. I had a tea and a chocolate croissant from Starbucks and later Dale had a burger (which he ate) and fries (which I ate) from Carl’s Jr. On a trip to the bathroom, after the tea, I noticed the departures display showed our flight to Calgary as delayed. Well now, that could be a problem as we had just over an hour to make our connecting flight after arriving in Calgary, and we would have to get our luggage, go through customs, and then get to our new gate, which would be in the domestic terminal. There was no point worrying about it so we just settled in to wait.
As it turned out the plane was only about 15 minutes late arriving. They called us to board and we went down the ramp to the plane but stood there outside the plane for about 10 minutes. We left about 30 minutes late but the flight crew said we had a strong tail wind and would get into Calgary only about 10 minutes later than planned. Great! Things were looking up. We had a snack, I read and Dale watched “House of Cards” on his iPad. The sky grew dark and we could see the sunset through the windows on the opposite side of the plane. Finally the flight attendants secured the plane for landing. As we taxied to the gate, we got the usual speech about staying seated with our seat belts on, yada yada yada… but then she added that a passenger was sick and the plane would be met by EMS at the gate. So we stayed seated as the woman and her friend made their way to the door after we were connected to the gate. But wait…the captain came over the PA system with this little tidbit; when a passenger on an international flight is ill, Transport Canada and a health agency, we can’t remember which one, had to sign off on the diagnosis, so the plane was officially under quarantine. No one and nothing off until the passenger was cleared of any contagious disease. We were right at the front of the plane so we could see and hear everything. It took over 10 minutes for the EMS attendant to arrive. Thankfully the woman wasn’t in dire straits. The attendant asked some questions and took some vitals and declared everything was fine. The captain asked about the other agencies and the attendant said they didn’t need to get involved. The woman, who had apparently had her first panic attack, was taken off the plane and we were allowed to get up and get our things. We hustled our bustles to customs and used our Nexus cards to get through as quickly as we could. The customs agent took only a minute to clear us and then we went to the luggage carousel to get our bags. Now remember we were quarantined so the luggage wasn’t offloaded until the woman was cleared. It took about half an hour to get our bags. We grabbed them, ran to the connecting flight area, dropped them off and went up the escalator to… security.
Thankfully, there were no lineups and we got through easily. But there was still the hurdle of getting to the domestic terminal, gate A20 to be specific. And then suddenly, there it was! The YCC terminal shuttle! We climbed on board and rode in comfort to the A gate section. We hoofed to our gate, noticing a distinct lack of people waiting there. We showed our documents to the gate attendants and walked to the plane. The flight crew said they were waiting for a couple more people from the same flight from Mexico that we were on. Good old WestJet! We learned as we were waiting that there was one more flight to Vancouver that night, so if we had missed this flight, we could still have made it home.
The flight to Vancouver was short. We got our luggage and got on the JetSet shuttle. We got off at the section where our car was parked, loaded the luggage, warmed the car up and drove home. We were greeted at home by a chirping smoke detector. It was located at the top of the stairs, a difficult place to access. With the appropriate and necessary swearing, Dale got the ladder and pulled it down. We washed our faces, brushed our teeth and got into bed. I awoke about four hours later, certain that I could hear the other smoke detectors chirping. Now, if you’ve read my other blogs you know my well-deserved paranoia about smoke alarms. I shook Dale awake and told him I could hear something and relayed my concerns. I got up and stood at the top of the stairs, listening. Nothing. I went back into the bedroom and stood by the open window. There was some beeping outside. Dale said it was the back-up alarm on a truck. I, of course, went back to sleep. Dale did not. About an hour later he got up and watched a NASCAR race he had taped while we were away.
When I got up I held the ladder as he replaced the smoke detector. Putting it up was much harder than taking it down. The first time he put it up, it immediately chirped. The battery was in backwards, so down it came again. The second time was the charm. Dale informed me that while I slept he changed the batteries in the other detectors. We emptied the suitcases and then Dale went to get our grandson. His arrival ended the streak of unfortunate events.