Australia - The Long Sad Experience Getting Home

 Our 14-hour Delta flight back to Los Angles had problems.  Therefore, we had problems.  A female passenger on the plane got sick and we were redirected to Hawaii so she could disembark and get treatment.  All 208 passengers were told to get off the plane and go through customs.  We had to get all our luggage and try to clear customs at 1:00 AM when the airport was almost deserted!  Then we were told we had to find our own flights to get back home!  What a nightmare.

Bill had never been to Hawaii before.  Now he never wants to go back.  

This sign in the Honolulu airport was interesting. The airport was old and outdated, and people there were not happy to see us.

It looked beautiful outside when the sun came up but we were stuck at the airport!

Why Delta could not drop the sick woman off and then continue on to L A is a question we never got answered.  Maybe it had to do with the flight crew hours worked? or another crew could not be found to take over.  Who knows?  Anyway, we called Delta headquarters and finally found a plane leaving later that morning for Detroit so we booked it.  Trouble is, we three had to sit in the cheap crowded seats at the back of the plane from Hawaii to Detroit.  Tight seating and the food was bad!

But we made it home to Grand Rapids about 9 hours later than we should have.  We were home in Frederic by 2 PM on Monday May 6 after a stop in Cadillac for supplies and lunch.  In all, we had flown on nine different aircraft and for the most part had a fun and interesting trip below the equator.  

PS:  For anyone so interested:  water going down a drain below the equator does flow in a counter-clockwise direction while ours up here goes clockwise down the drain.  Also, we could see stars in the sky down there that we will never see up here.  

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