“Have you applied for us to be on The Amazing Race Canada?” Dan asked me a few days ago. He had just seen a commercial for the casting call and was tempted by the idea of fame and fortune and spending so much quality time with the love of his life.
Heh.
“Are you CRAZY?” I retorted. “We’d kill each other! It would be the worst experience of our lives!”
The truth is, Dan and I would probably be the best candidates for the show only because it would be hilarious to watch how horribly we suck at travelling.
It started as soon as we got married. Like, literally mere hours after we said “I do”. We were booked to take a cruise for our honeymoon and although we had flights to get us to our departure port in time when the trip was originally booked, sometime between then and our wedding day, the flights changed. Our travel agent called and told us that we were now scheduled to fly out on the previous day, which meant we were supposed to be boarding a plane at the same time I was supposed to walk down the aisle.
A honeymoon doesn’t make much sense without a wedding, does it?
The only other flight option would get us to port with absolutely no time to spare.
You can imagine how this story ends. So now take what you’re imagining and imagine it worse.
We never even made it to Florida, our departure port city. A lightning storm required us to land prematurely and sit on a tarmac for hours before we could continue on to Atlanta, our stopover destination. By this point the cruise ship had long ago set sail. We stood in a customer service line that was the length of the Atlanta airport while waiting on hold on our cell phones with Delta for hours. After three hours of this we decided to give up and just find a hotel in the city….
…where our credit card was declined.
Dan and I spent our first married day stressed to the max and unsure whether we would even be able to have (or enjoy) a honeymoon. (Here’s a good suggestion: Get travel insurance.)
Once we got through our honeymoon experience, we hoped that we had used up all the bad travel karma that would come our way. Unfortunately, we were wrong.
I’m currently in the midst of a Toronto trip. Although we will be in the city where my husband grew up and we will be visiting his family, I’ll also be involved with a little working project. Underneath all the packing lists and itineraries and phone calls and emails has been my underlying fear about stepping out and doing this brand new thing. So, I’ve promised myself to just roll with the trip and experience it as an adventure.
Except, sometimes it is hard to just roll with things.
We flew into the downtown Toronto airport on Friday night. Despite being on a tiny plane past bedtime with a toddler and a baby, the flight went smoothly. (My kids are awesome).
Once landed, things got a little… chaotic.
We made it to the shuttle that would take us to the heart of downtown Toronto where we were to find our rental car. We got off the bus, piled our luggage on the sidewalk around us, and just stood.
Toronto is big.
I’m so naive. I just kind of expected we would get off the bus and I would see the sign for the car rental place. It couldn’t possibly be that hard.
It was.
While I wore Gavin and Cameron switched from holding my hand to Dan’s hand and back to my hand, we wandered a few blocks underneath the CN Tower for a couple of hours. Hours! In the middle of winter.
No one could tell us where the car rental agency was. And the people who could tell us didn’t actually provide correct directions. We were lost.
And I just felt so little.
I didn’t know where we were or how to get to where I needed to be or how my hands would hold the playpen for one minute longer. And my kids! My poor poor babies were wandering this big cold city with us long past the time they should have been in bed.
By the time we found the car rental agency it was nearing midnight and obviously closed. And those car seats that we were supposed to have rented were locked away in a back room.
“Do you still think we’d be good at The Amazing Race?” I asked my husband while stranded in the middle of the biggest city in Canada.
“Well. I never said I thought we could win The Amazing Race!”
This is why I so often just stay at home in my pajamas all day. When you leave the house, big things happen. And no matter how much you try to prepare, there is no telling how those big things will go.
It is just easier to stay home.
Cameron and I are here in Toronto so that we can be involved in a TV shoot. When I was sent the request for an audition, I almost ignored it. Auditioning would be scary. Putting myself out there to be judged is frightening. What if they picked me? What if they didn’t pick me?
It is just easier to do nothing.
But I did the video. I sent it in. Little me made a big move. I resolved to put myself out there and just accept whatever happened.
And I am doing that. Still. I did on Friday night as we stood, out there, in the middle of Toronto, wishing so much to be back home in my little bed.
So this is an adventure?
Here we go, then.
Do you have any travel horror stories? I’d love to hear them!
I am currently tweeting and Instagraming this trip using the hashtag #LaurasTOAdventure. I’d love to have you following along! It makes this whole thing a little less scary.
Travel horror stories, maybe it’s just that I don’t really travel that often but I really don’t have much experience in that department that I can remember. Only thing I can think of was the one night we ended up in a rather sketchy campground :S
Ah – sketchy campgrounds. I grew up spending all my summers camping, so I certainly have a crappy campground story or two (or a million).
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Trip this summer started with re-booking flight because visa wasn’t ready on time. Spent two hours in the Frankfurt air port looking for my parents. (Never traveling without a cell phone ever again!) Rental company closing early, no record of the reservation, quoted price online was not the price in person. Another rental company was willing to rent us a vehicle as long as we didn’t leave the city. Got a truck, driver got changed at the last minute and we ended up with an extra person in the car because the driver didn’t know the area we were going. On the way back to the city; flat tire and the carberator started acting up 1 km from a gas station. Luckly, it all worked out in the end and our motto for the trip became “it is what it is.”
First of all: WOW! I am SO glad I didn’t go through that! It sounds super stressful!
Secondly: Isn’t it funny how experiences like this push us to adopt positive mindsets (like “it is what it is”)? That always happens to me. (This most recent experience it was “This is an adventure”.)
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Loads of travel horror stories. Missing my connection in Montreal with a one and three year old, having Jonathan’s old passport flagged as lost or stolen at us customs, changing a #3 in an aeroplane toilet only to find the nappy bag empty and the seat belt sign turn on. Pre kids our baggage got lost containing my wedding dress for our vowel renewal in Canada. But they are all times we can look back and laugh at. Enjoy your adventures! Loving your blog as always.
Jane! It doesn’t surprise me you have these stories, with all the international flying with kids you’ve had to do!
Your “nappy” story reminds me of what happened on the way home from this most recent trip. In the airport right before the plane was to board, I realized Gavin needed to have a diaper change. After pulling off the diaper, I realized he wasn’t actually done doing his business. I managed to clean up and get back to the waiting area. There, Dan notified me that Cam was stinky too. Off to the bathroom again. By the time I finished with him, I found out that Gavin was stinky AGAIN. In the middle of changing him I not only ran out of wipes, put the plane started boarding so we had to rush. As we walked onto the plane, I noticed that I had poop on my hands. :S
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
I love your poop story! On your hands too, o’well the bright side is you made your flight and the boys butts were clean. Nice work Mumma xx
Gah! I wish you guys called me!! I would have helped you guys out. Any time you fly into Toronto, I’m only an email/phone call away. What’s an adventure without a few bumps? You’ll have a great story to tell. :)
In the middle of the city, I had no idea what to do! Afterwards I realized I definitely should have put the call out to friends online about it. I’m sure I could have gotten a car seat and a drive into Thornhill. Thank you so much friend for the offer of help! :)
I’m sorry I didn’t get to see you this time we were there. It was hard trying to see two families and do work on the side! I went to the Starbucks we met at though and thought of you! :)
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
What a stressful start! I hope the rest of it goes smoothly. Good for you for putting yourself out there. My husband and I would KILL each other in the amazing race.
Leigh Ann recently posted..I ran today, and you can too
The rest of the trip did go (relatively) smoothly for me. I’m glad we got that terrible part out of the way!
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Hehe that would be wedding vows :)
Oh my, sorry you had to go through that, especially with the poor children!
We rarely encounter horror travel because both my husband and I are totally anal-retentive when it comes to trips. We plan every single detail, and we are always prepared for the worst. We also find out where everything is (Google maps), how to get there (GPS, he downloads the maps), where to go (we mark down our to-go places, including restaurants), and we are always super early for flights.
The last trip we had though? I was recovering from a stomach bug. The toddler was in the midst of suffering from the same bug (for a small boy who was throwing up and eating/ drinking very little, he was a trooper) and my husband actually threw up in the plane multiple times. Our first stop when we got to Australia, was the ER :)
So excited for you! Have a great time and good luck!
Alison recently posted..Do. Or When The Easy Becomes Difficult
I think the hardest part about this trip was that it was being planned for me, so I was just getting things second hand. It makes it harder to plan that way, although it made it cheaper! :)
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Oh dear Laura…not the most exciting start to your road to stardom :)
And travel “horror stories” that I may have pale in comparison (maybe that’s partly due to my OCD :) )…and I’m hoping to keep it that way!
Fingers crossed your trip carries on a bit more smooooooooothly!!
candice rempel recently posted..A word for 2013
Ha! my “stardom”. You’re hilarious Candice!
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Oh dear. That sounds like a very rough few hours after landing… I love visiting big cities, but have yet with a child- let alone two!!
It sounds like you handles the chaos fairly well considering the obstacles that were thrown at you involving the car rental.
My hubby and I were in a somewhat similar situation while in Montreal involving a car rental, not being able to find it- them not accepting DH identification/visa. Though we did not have children with us, but did have a deadline for DH to return to the Quebec basic training military base in time to do a shift and hope to travel back to Montreal to complete the long weekend together.
It was stressful!!
First flight with my baby in April-will be just shy of 5 months to Cuba will be interesting…
Cuba?! That will be awesome! How long is the flight? Hopefully your little one does awesome on it! Gavin loved flying in the plane. He was stuck in a small space with SO MANY PEOPLE to smile at. It was his little personal heaven!
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
The only horror story I can remember was heading to visit my parents when it was just Jordan. Because if customs, we ended up missing our connecting flight in Toronto. Air Canada blamed the delay on weather (which it had NOTHING to do with) and wouldn’t put us up in a hotel. Dumb me just packed enough diapers for one day, so off we went to find a hotel with one diaper for the night and one for the next morning. There were no convenient places to buy diapers so without paying a bunch for a can to take us somewhere so we hoped we would make it. We did make it but used both diapers before morning. So we used a swimmer and tried to get to my parents house as fast as we could upon landing. Whew!! Not as stressful sounding as your story though. Hope things get better!! :) have a great adventure!!!
I dunno. Sounds pretty stressful. Anything that means bodily fluids might not be contained is totally stressful!
Oh no! Sorry about your honeymoon! Traveling is hard sometimes and I can’t imagine how much harder with little ones. We’ve only taken 1 trip with D and it was a road trip. She did fine but the people we went to see were a disaster so…
I’ve had lost luggage and flight delays but nothing too crazy, knock on wood. My husband always gets stressed though b/c he’s convinced something is going to go wrong.
Rach (DonutsMama) recently posted..Two
Oh boy – travelling can definitely be made harder when the people you are visiting don’t make it easy. (We have our fair share of that sometimes too).
I’m probably like your husband. I get SUPER STRESSED right before we leave because I am so worried about how things will go. I am happy to be home now with no immediate plans to travel again.
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
On the day we were about to check in for our flight to our honeymoon 13 years ago I forgot to bring my picture ID (with all the packing and craziness). I started to ball.. my eyes were swollen and mascara smeared I held out our marriage certificate. Our plane was about to leave! I thought our St. Lucia dreams were ruined because I was a ditz. The manager was called and he came with a polaroid (remember those?) snapped a picture and a handwritten affidavit with my signature. And with that we ran to the gate… they held the plane and took any two seats.
Yes big things happen when you leave the house… and a great story.
Great wishes on your adventure… have been following it IG!
Alma recently posted..A New Year Giveaway!!
I’m so glad your story turned out like it did! On our honeymoon, things started to turn around the second day in. When everything went wrong the first day, everything went right the second. My Father in Law called our hotel room at 4 in the morning and told us he worked out our flights, we would fly to the Cayman Islands and meet the cruise ship there. We grabbed the last cab to the airport before the taxi drivers went on strike. And the airlines put us up in a hotel in the Cayman Islands and paid for our food. I always hope the adventure will turn around for the better, and it usually does! :)
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Oh, Laura, how TERRIBLE. I can imagine what that was like with the boys. My only trip to Canada was for my honeymoon with my first husband. We went to kind of a “luxury” campsite, which was actually pretty awesome. But, we didn’t have time to make our connecting flight in Toronto to get there, and no one with the airline would help us or get us a hotel. So, the first night of our honeymoon was spent sleeping on the benches in the enormous Toronto airport. Because we did not venture out. I still hate thinking about it. I’ve seen your pictures on IG, and it looks like the rest of your trip was better. I can’t wait to hear all about it!
Greta @gfunkified recently posted..Every Day I’m Shoveling
The rest of the trip did go wonderfully, especially compared to the disaster that started it. I’m super sorry that your only trip to Canada was mired with such a lousy travel experience. Canada is really pretty great otherwise! :)
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
Oh gosh, girl. It’s one thing to have that happen when it’s just you and your husband but with kids…. so stressful. But you made it through. I’m enjoying all the pics on Instagram!
Courtney recently posted..void
Oh, it was rough, Courtney! But we made it – and are even home now! It certainly felt nice to be home after all that (even though the rest of the trip went really well)!
Laura recently posted..Little Girl in the Big City
What was the TV shoot for?