What a whirlwind it’s been the past few weeks. You may remember having read, in our newsletter or on our Facebook page, that I was attending a conference in Napa Valley. Since it was only a two day conference I was able to extend the trip and take my husband and daughter. Yes, we took our four year old to Napa. Yes, I’ll blog about taking kids to Napa soon. Before heading to Napa, we had the pleasure of spending time on the Monterey Peninsula We visited Monterey, Carmel, Pebble Beach and even drove down the iconic HWY 1 to Big Sur before we headed to Napa for 4 nights. While the time spent on the Monterey Peninsula, as well as the time in Napa was fabulous, getting home was a bit of a challenge.
The day we left Napa was also the day the Bay Area was hit with the “Pineapple Express.” You’re probably asking the same question I did, “What’s a pineapple express?” Well, it’s a rain and wind storm that blew in from the Pacific, not unlike a Nor’easter here on the East Coast, but it didn’t seem nearly as severe. Unfortunately, it was severe enough to delay our flight home out of San Francisco.
I received two phone calls on the way from Napa to the airport. The first said that the flight was delayed and instructed me to go to the airport as scheduled. The second call said that the flight was delayed but told me NOT to go to the airport. Both calls were automated recordings. Luckily, it was able to get Ann on the phone to start looking into availability for alternate flights. With weather bad in San Francisco and not promising to improve, we decided our best option was to leave on the delayed flight and overnight at our connection point, which was Chicago, where the weather forecast was calling for an unseasonably warm and sunny day.
However, instead of taking the first flight the following morning from Chicago at 6am, we were able to take the last flight of the day at 7pm. The reasoning behind this was two-fold. Knowing we wouldn’t be arriving in Chicago until after 10pm, the thought of having to be back at the airport at 4am with a 4 year old was not something we were looking forward to. Secondly, we were the one’s paying for the hotel room, as the delay was weather related, so we decided to make the best of it. Instead of staying at a hotel near the airport, I made a reservation downtown just a block off Michigan Avenue. We were able to turn what for many would have been a bad experience into a good one.
Shortly before midnight we settled into a cozy hotel room overlooking the Chicago skyline lit for Christmas. The following morning we hit the streets and were able to see some of this beautiful city and even enjoy some famous Chicago deep dish pizza for lunch before flying home.
While the trip from the time we left the Westin Verasa Resort in Napa, until we crawled into bed at home was nearly 36 hours, the time spent seeing Chicago all decked out for the holidays made it all worthwhile. Obviously, the trip would have been shorter had we accepted the offer of the first flight out the following morning, but it wouldn’t have been nearly as enjoyable. Ultimately, isn’t that what travel is all about, enjoyment? Or as Jimmy Buffet sings, “Go fast enough to get there, but slow enough to see.”