Bruce's Airport Nightmares

Airports (mostly) SUCK!

I passed through security, bought 2 small bottles of water for Jack's formula at $6.00 US at the store and had them taken away 2 minutes minutes later, only 10 meters from boarding the airplane. You never know what to expect in airports.

On a recent trip to and around Argentina my family and I passed through a number of airports:

1. Ottawa, Canada
2. Newark, New Jersey, USA
3. Orlando, Florida (free WiFi)
4. Sao Paulo, Brazil ($$$ WiFi)
5. Montevideo, Uruguay (free WiFi)
6. Jorges Newberry, Buenos Aires, Argentina
7. El Calefate, Argentina ($$ WiFi)
8. Salta, Argentina
9. Iguazu, Argentina
10. Miami, Florida, USA
11. Washington D.C., USA

From the most disgusting airport of Sao Paulo, Brazil to the most amazing Carrasco Airport of Montevideo it certainly helps to be prepared when traveling with a child. I've learned that airports & airlines hardly ever have similar protocols and that you should NEVER assume things will be the same. For example, some airports will make you go through security even if you're taking a connecting flight within the same terminal and others won't. Some airports will make you dump all of your water (used for making baby juice) even if the bottle hasn't been opened and other airports won't. Some airlines will make you pick your baby stroller up at the baggage claim (huge pain in the ass) and others will have it opened up and ready to go when you get off the plane. My point is that you should expect the worst and prepare to practice patience when traveling through multiple airports. There are also a WHOLE BUNCH of 'grown up' issues (departure fees, lack of clocks, etc) as well but I won't get into the details.

What I would really like to talk about is the stark contrast between the Sao Paulo airport in Brazil and the Carrasco airport in Montevideo. Sao Paulo is hot, smelly, poorly organized, has disgusting bathrooms, is ugly, has overpriced disgusting restaurants, annoying security placements, long walks between terminals and mediocre duty free stores. On the other hand, Carrasco has beautiful architecture with beautiful views, floors so clean that you can see your reflection, modern restaurants at respectable prices and an amazing duty free shop, calming music and most importantly it has happy people everywhere.

Carrasco also had a nice light show in the mezzanine, an upscale McDonalds restaurant (only coffees, deserts and homemade sandwiches) and FREE Wifi (I think Sao Paulo charges 10 USD / hour). Check out the pictures of Carrasco below. There are no other airports worth mentioning... they are all somewhere in between the two mentioned above.

http://tinyurl.com/32xzuqy

(more pictures if you follow link)

Travel Stage 1 - Crazy things in Florida

FLIGHT TO FLORIDA

Jack's first flight from Ottawa to Newark, New Jersey went quite well. I don't remember anything but smiles and that twitching thing he does when he's really excited. He spent most of his time staring at people across the isle, playing with his bording pass and his favourite activity of all which is staring at the lights on the ceiling. The descent wasn't a problem on either flight... but I really don't know what the altitudes were. I suppose the 8 hour flight to Uruguay is going to be at higher altitude which means a longer decent and likely more problems with the tempanic membrane (ear).

STROLLER & STARING AT MORE LIGHTS

We took a little drive over to the Home Depot today looking for a 'universal sink plug' and a 'retractable clothes line' called a flexoline, which are both pivotal items to have when traveling overseas on a budget. The sink plug will fit in almost any sink so that we can do our our laundry. The clothes line is brilliant because it's elastic, can stretch to 7 feet, has hooks on both ends and you can pull apart the elastic fibers to insert your clothes, eliminating the need for clothes pegs! Unfortately the 'flexoline' was nowhere to be found so we had to settle for regular rope.

At Home Depot we found the sink plug which was right around the corner from the 'Holy Shit!' isle. Vicky tells me ...'You have to see the next isle!' Judging by her excitement I probably should have had the camera ready but I was still upset about not finding my flexoline. The next isle was the width of 2-3 regular isles with the entire ceiling covered in lights!

You must be thinking... "HOLY CRAP BRUCE, REALY? LIGHTS?" Please don't close your browser yet... when you have a baby who loves staring at lights and ceiling fans, combining the two could cause some type of stimulation overload, and you'd know that things could get interesting.

Another photo (click here)

DOG ON TRUCK

And now for my 'WTF' moment of the day, I spotted this dog sitting on the back on a covered pickup truck going down the highway at approximately 65-70 MPH (close to 120 km/h). I figured the guy was driving this fast because we were doing the speed limit and he passed us. I imagined how horrible I would feel seeing even a minor accident. Click on this link to watch the video!

A lot of other things happened today like Jack cutting his finger on my beer can when I looked the other way. I wouldn't have known if I didn't see the blood because he didn't even flinch. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

Jack also hummed something in response to Vicky's humming. He also hit someone over the head when they tried to play 'peek-a-boo' with him. Apparently, he was smart enough to know where the person was hiding.

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