Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

After we got to LA on Friday, here's what happened. We spent the night at an overpriced Mariott by the LA airport because we couldn't find any other hotels that had rooms available. It was getting very late, so we finally sucked it up and paid $249 for a hotel room that was no better than a Days Inn (my opinon only, of course)! Gracie was wide awake at 3 a.m., so DH went ahead and went to bed, and I let Gracie play quietly on the floor in front of the bathroom, so as not disturb DH. Gracie finally settled down to sleep at about 4:30 a.m., and all 3 of us slept until about 6. DH got up and went to the airport to see what we could take to get us home. Gracie and I slept until about 7 a.m.

DH came back from the airport feeling not very optomistic about us getting out of LA to anywhere that would take us to Indianapolis. But we decided to give it a try, so we all headed over to the airport at about 8:30 a.m. to try to get on any flight we could. We tried to get to Chicago on 3 different flights, and then to Kansas City with no success. DH was exhausted, and said that we would try one more flight that was scheduled to leave for Chicago at 6:55. By the grace of God, we made it on that flight, although we weren't able to sit together. DH sat in a middle seat with Gracie and I sitting in the middle seat in the row behind him. We arrived into Chicago at 11:30 p.m., and of course had to see about getting another hotel for the night before flying home on Saturday.

DH's usual stayover hotel in Chicago, La Quinta, where we could've gotten a room for $89, was full. So we opted to stay right at the airport in the Hilton for a "cheap" $169. We also decided that we wouldn't rush to catch the 6 a.m. flight the next morning to Indianapolis, and instead get as much sleep as we could. You could imagine how tired we were! So we got up and walked over to the United terminal and easily got on the 12:55 p.m. flight home. We landed in Indianapolis at about 2 p.m., took a van to our car, and put Gracie in her brand new carseat to head home!

So to sum up, here's how we ended up getting from China to Indianapolis:

Train from Guangzhou, China to Hong Kong train station; a bus from Hong Kong train station to the Novatel Hotel; a van from the Novatel to the Hong Kong Airport; a plane from Hong Kong to LA, a plane from LA to Chicago, a plan from Chicago to the Indianapolis airport, and a car ride home from there.

That's our version of "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles!"