Willkommen!

Yes, that's German for welcome... or maybe hello... I really don't know at this point... or care...

Now if you've been paying close attention, you may be a bit confused. At no point in our planned itinerary were we to stop in Germany. Rather, it's (hopefully) the last leg of Murphy-kicking-us-in-the-ass-Law.

So everything was going smoothly, no delays... we're cruising down the Van Wyck... waving to Shea stadium etc. We arrive at JFK, head to the Olympic Airlines counter (not actually planning to check in, we still had 6 hrs before our flight was to leave) and findout that our flight's been delayed an additional 4 hours... meaning we wouldn't be able to catch the cruise out of Athens.

So a bunch of Amazing-race-esque running around later... phone calls to our travel insurance folkies... hooking up the laptop to scope out the best flight, best price... and hopefully leaving in the next 3 hours.

We settle on Berlin Air. We have to get from Terminal 1 to Terminal 4... and an hour and a bit before our flight was to leave. Taxis refuse to take us (you have to go the "official" route, through a taxi-organizer I guess... we were trying to flag one down) ... Finallyl we check in... we're the last ones (they have already taken down the Berlin Air signs.... are dismantling the lineup posts etc)... and the kind lady marks our tickets as 'special'. Talk about special treatment.

Heh.

Special alright... turns out it meant we had been "randomly" selected to go through an intense search of self and carry-ons at security. Somehow along the way, the security nimrods managed to lose Jeff's boarding pass... and we're told to go on without it... by the time we finally get to the Berlin Air gate, they think we are totally useless Canuks, no boarding pass, running for the plane etc.

Seven hours later, we arrive in glorious Dusseldorf... and they've lost our bags. The next hour or so is spent trying to overcome a significant language barrier... and somehow arrange to *maybe* get our bags sent to Athens for after we return from the cruise... but they may have to be sent to Rankin. Who knows.

I came out of it okay, I packed really light and had checked an almost-empty duffel... just had all my liquids/tolitries etc. Jeff on the other hand ... well now needs to powershop for an entire 10-day trip to Greece... in under 2 hours.

Somewhat of a fiasco... but tonite we'll be on a boat... and hopefully will begin the relaxing part of this vacation. We could really use it.