One More Sleep... Again...
Well, it turned out to a fantastic night sleep! The Hilton had such a cozy bed. Soft sheets and a perfectly weighted comforter made for the ultimate nesting situation. Thankfully, we got a late check-out at 3pm… we moved very slowly. Prepping ourselves for yet, another overnight flight.
Out to the shuttle at three o’clock we go! Let’s try this again… our van driver was so sweet! He knew all the tricks to bypass the crazy traffic jam outside departures at EWR airport.
Quickest security line ever! Newark Airport had all the lines separated into different areas on the departure level. CLEAR was in one area, CLEAR with TSA had it’s own special spot. Everything was efficient. If you opt in, CLEAR uses facial recognition to quickly move the passenger through the line. No ID, no fingerprints or eye scanning that usually give me so much trouble. The luggage was set in bins and scanned similar to the European airports… very fast! From hotel to Mimosa took a total of twenty-six minutes. That might be a record!
Using the mobile ordering in the restaurant, I found the burgers could be selected with gluten-free bun and sweet potato fries. Big treat for me and just what the jetlag doctor ordered!
Walking past this festive display, I had to stop for a photo… it feels like I’m stuck somewhere between the Hotel California (where you can never leave) and Groundhog’s Day (the movie). We have spent far too much time in this airport to not be getting anywhere! We could have been enjoying our second day in Europe but instead, we are still in Newark Airport! Ugh…
Our aircraft arrive to the gate early… that’s a good sign. Both of us are dreading another night of no sleep… who knows, maybe we will be so tired, we’ll be able to catch a few winks. The good part of this is that initially, we were not assigned seats. At first this seemed like no big deal because I can just log onto the United app and select our seats. Unfortunately, there were very few Economy Plus options, and the only ones left were middle seats. After waiting for 90 minutes, I got a representative to help assign the seats. He said he would put a note in that we would prefer an aisle or window. Later in the evening, I noticed two seats open up. One by the window and one a row back on the aisle. Again, I went on the chat… this time I was able to get past the AI “agent” and speak to a human. We were assigned the two seats… this will make the flight a little less painful.
Hanging out in our “home away from home”, at this point, we only had two and a half hours until boarding time. See? We are still alive and kicking! Testing out the translator earbuds, I realized I better buy the package for $16. Of course, it said it was included when I bought them, but it was a great sale price. I’ll get these things working!
Not so bad… I watched a couple of movies. For some reason, I love watching movies on the airplane more than anywhere else… The flight went by pretty quickly. The gluten-free meals I ordered were sent to Barry both time. It was fine because I couldn’t really eat them anyway… the main dinner was a chicken cacciatore (couldn’t eat the tomato/marinara) and the breakfast said G/F but something told me to look…it was a hot apple pie, like at McDonalds. The first ingredient… wheat! So… rations for me haha.
We arrived in Brussels. Realizing we weren’t automatically checked in for the second flight, we had no boarding passes. That would need immediate attention. Luckily, we had four hours before our flight.
Opening the spot to “check-in”, this is the first thing we see… the flight was still listed on the board but it shows to be cancelled. Our first thought was, at what point do we give up and go home??? We had to get creative to find out about this. Already inside security, we did not want to have to clear again so we needed to take care of this inside… European flights are run differently than in the US. The gate isn’t announced until twenty-ish minutes before boarding begins. With nearly 150 gates in the A section (the only info provided), we decided to search down any agent with Brussels Airlines who wasn’t actively boarding a flight. Voila! We located a guy willing to help us. He said the flight was NOT cancelled… he could see our names and our seat assignment. His suggestion was to wait for our flight an have the agent print up our boarding passes.
Trying to think outside the box, I downloaded the airline app. From there it was easy to create an account and check-in. We now have boarding passes!!!
Brussels Airport is a minimalistic design but very nice. We found a comfortable place to sit … the agent who helped us, slipped up and provided the gate number that we would have waited hours for. It was time to settle in and people watch. In the photo on the right, I found it amusing to see the slide. Wouldn’t it be a fun way to exit the aircraft? Go down the slide? Instead, I’m told it is for baggage… I like the slide exit idea better! :-)
Had we been stuck overnight in Brussels, it would not have been so bad… there are plenty of comfortable spots to wait out flights. The little cubicle seat Barry is in, provides side pads that really block out noise. On the right hand photo, people are comfortably waiting on lounge chairs. Passengers can fully stretch out! We didn’t notice them until too late… that would have been perfect! Lesson learned. I made a note of that for future reference :-)
In addition to the comfortable seats, there were also some not-so-comfortable spots to wait out your time. This charging area was not utilized at all… hmmm… I wonder why? haha
Looking at the aircraft, you can see the captain hanging out the window cleaning. Kind of entertaining… I asked Barry if he ever had to do that… fully expecting a “no”. He said yes… if cleaners weren’t available.
We made it! Our final destination… Malaga, Spain! A town we frequent because it’s just special. We checked in quickly (two days late) and settled into our flat. After a little unpacking, we headed to a restaurant we love. Turns out, it had been sold and remodeled. It was actually, better than ever! They had a full gluten-free menu for me. We ordered a pitcher of sangria… my phone battery was almost dead so I got no photos. However, we will definitely return for another pitcher and meal.
Barry broke all the travel rules… he decided to take a “short nap”. You never do that… or it takes forever for your body clock to reset. Oh well, it gave me time to type this up. And now, it is a decent hour to head off to sleep. Tomorrow, I will share photos of our accommodations and of the town we love… it might be a beach day depending on our energy level.
