Wednesday--Victoria to Vancouver to Seattle to Texas

The LAST installment of our Seattle trip.
Wednesday morning we woke up really early (it's so much easier to wake up early when the sun comes out at 4:30 AM), loaded up the car, and drove up to where the ferries from Vancouver Island leave to the mainland, about 30 minutes away.  This ferry was HUGE, much bigger than the ferry coming from Port Angeles.  Waiting in the car in line to get onto the ferry, I was doubtful that all the cars would be able to fit, but those ferries are bigger than they look!  The ferry ride was about 2 hours, and it was beautiful.  There are dozens of lushly forested gulf islands between Vancouver Island and mainland Vancouver.  I stayed inside the ferry most of the time (it was COLD outside), so I didn't really get great pictures, but we did go outside for a couple of minutes.  Here's the shoreline of one of the islands we passed by.

Inside the boat, Ben was busy working. 

But he's not too upset about it.  :-)

Brigham admiring the scenery.

Mosey just thought it was cold.

Here's another ferry just like ours, and a view of some of the islands in the distance.

We were back on the mainland by 9:00 AM, and our flight out of Seattle wasn't until 3:00, so we thought we had time to drive into Vancouver, only 20 minutes away.  Or so we thought.  Vancouver has horrible traffic!  I couldn't believe how bad it was!  We never did get to the downtown, because we had to leave in order to make our flight.  So I wasn't real impressed with Vancouver.  We made it to the border and then sat and waited for nearly an hour before finally making through into the US.  I was starting to sweat at this point.  I was only slightly distracted by the very solemn looking older gentleman standing on the side of the road holding a sign announcing, "PREPARE FOR THE RAPTURE, MAY 21, 2011.  REPENT NOW!"  Wow, I hadn't realized the end was so near.  :-)  We finally got through the border and once we were back in the good old USA, the highway had more reasonable speed limits.  The speed limits are SO SLOW in Canada!  I drove as fast as I dared and made it to the airport just a little less than 2 hours before our flight.  I thought we were safe. 
Well, our flight OUT of Seattle was nearly as exciting as our flight INTO Seattle, and not in a good way.  I dropped Ben off to check his bag and get our boarding passes while I took the van back to the rental return area.  For some reason they made me go back down into the rental office in order to finish checking out.  I'm not sure why the guy couldn't do it in the parking garage, but there was some problem.  So I waited in line before finally being able to check out and start heading to the airport terminal.  Meanwhile Ben was having "issues" with Continental.  They apparently had switched computer systems the day before and somehow lost the records for our flight!  Ben went from line to line, person to person, with no one able to figure out what happened.  I knew we were on the flight because Orbitz had called me 3 hours before the flight to let me know it was on time!  The people at the desk kept telling Ben to use different credit cards at different kiosks.  At one point he waited in line to talk with an actual person.  She was looking through the computer trying to find us, and then suddenly asked Ben if he was a Continental Gold Club member or whatever, which Ben was not.  "Oh, I'm sorry, this line is only for Gold Club Members.  You'll need to go wait in that line over there for another ticket agent."  Okaaaay, our flight is now less than an hour away, and the problem is obviously with Continental, and they're making him go to another LINE?  Really?  Anyway, finally he was able to talk with a real person who managed to find our records and print boarding passes.  Our flight is now about a half hour away and we haven't gone through security.  I finally make it back from the car rental place with the rest of our bags (we used mostly carry-on suitcases so we wouldn't have to pay the $25/bag to check them).  Usually security is pretty fast for me because with a wheelchair I bypass the line and go straight to the x-ray machines.  However, they only had 2 X-ray machines open and the line was horrendously long.  We bypassed some of the line, but not all of it.  Finally we got to the X-ray machines, now 15 minutes before our flight.  Ben and the boys make it through, but I'm sitting there waiting for a female agent to come do the pat-down, since obviously I can't go through the metal detector gate in my wheelchair.  The TSA agent at the x-ray machine asked a couple of times in a very non-urgent voice, "Female agent needed at lane 1."  I told her, "You know, my flight leaves in 15 minutes.  My husband and kids are already through security waiting for me."  She said, "Well, we're a little understaffed today, sorry."  On, you're SORRY, huh?  What the heck-- we're about to miss our flight, and she couldn't care less!!!!  Finally another agent came, and to her credit she gave me the FASTEST pat down I've ever had.  Finally I get through, and we start RUNNING through the airport trying to find our gate (full disclosure-- Ben and the boys were running, I was holding on for dear life :-)).  Well, we keep running, and running, and running, and then discover we have to get on a TRAIN to get to our gate.  And the train is downstairs, so we have to wait for the SLOWEST elevator in the WORLD because I can't go down the escalator.  We just miss the train because of the stupid slow elevator and have to wait another 2 minutes for the next train.  Our flight is now scheduled to be taking off in less than 5 minutes.  Finally we get off the train, and then have to go back UP another elevator.  At this point, Continental begins to redeem itself by sending a gate agent to wait for us at the elevator.  She calls and tells the flight crew that we're coming, and we rush out of the elevator, down the hall to what must surely be the very farthest away gate in the ENTIRE Seattle airport.  They don't even bother taking our boarding passes, but send us hurtling down the ramp to the plane.  At which point the front wheels of my wheelchair get caught on one of the metal connecting things on the floor of the telescoping ramp to the plane and I go flying off my wheelchair and land sprawling on the ground along with the 5 bags I was carrying on my lap so the boys could run unencumbered.  That was a really great moment in my life.  Anyway, we do FINALLY make it to the plane where we have to walk all the way down to the end of the plane with everyone looking at us and knowing we are the jerks that they've been sitting there waiting for during the past 10 minutes.  Ah, well, we finally made it to our seats.
The flight from Seattle to Denver was fine until we were about an hour outside of Denver.  Then we started flying into a great big nasty storm sitting over Denver.  The plane was rocking and rolling with the turbulence, another really awesome thing that I love so much.  I was sitting there squeezing the arm rests of my seat wondering if all the drama at the Seattle airport was God's way of helping us to MISS the flight because it was going to go down in a storm killing everyone on board.  Now that would be irony.  However, we did manage to land safely in Denver and got on our next flight uneventfully.  It was another bumpy ride getting out of Denver, but at least on this flight our family was able to sit together.  On the flight from Denver they had seated us randomly around the plane, no one next to anyone else.  If I'm going to die in a plane crash along with my whole family, I at least want to be able to be holding their hands as the plane goes down.  Aren't these lovely thoughts to be having sitting in a plane going 500 miles an hour 30,000 feet in the air?  But, somehow we made it through that flight as well, and landed smoothly in Austin at around 11:00 PM.  We got our bags, got our car, and were home at around 12:30 AM.  What a long day.
Anyway, it wasn't the most pleasant ending to an otherwise awesome trip, but all's well that ends well, right?
I was WAY too stressed and harangued to take any pictures during our return-trip adventures, so all of those lovely memories will have to remain in my mind's eye.  :-)