How not to start your vacation...

...a true story.

First of all let me start by saying that Ben and I had an amazing trip to Vienna. I will be sharing all of those details once I sort through the 700 or so pictures on our camera.

But before we get to all of the fun our trip sure got off to a rocky start.

We flew out of DFW on Friday. Our flight was held on the ground for 2 hours and then an additional hour once we got on the plane because of fog in Atlanta. And that's the star of this story, the Atlanta Airport, or purgatory, depending on your particular religious persuasion. Unless it is completely and utterly unavoidable I will never set foot in that place again.

We were told repeatedly that all flights were delayed and that we would all make our connections. Our connecting flight left 5 minutes before we landed. Over 60 people on our plane missed that connection. Once we walked to the Delta counter we were met with the longest line I'd ever seen in an airport.

Ben had the genius idea to get on to the phone to Delta customer service to see if we could get a new flight. And it would have been a genius idea if anyone who works for Delta ever tells you anything remotely accurate. The lady on the phone told us that if we ran to the gate we could get on a flight to Copenhagen and then fly to Vienna from there.

I don't think there is anything that makes you feel sillier than running through an airport terminal. You're weighed done with bags, you're passing people who have nothing else to do but sit and watch you make a fool out of yourself and half the time you're dressed for the climate of your destination and not your connection airport.

So by the time we reached the Copenhagen gate, I was sweaty, out of breath, my pants were falling off and I was on the verge of tears. I was in fact, as a certain diminutive Project Runway winner would say, a hot mess.

So if you've ever seen an episode of The Amazing Race, I'm sure you know what happens next. The sweaty out of breath contestants plead their case to the stone-faced airline employees (it's life or death, this flight is worth a million dollars!). Only to be told that there is no way to get them on the flight (even though there is plenty of time and room by the way). And that's pretty much what happened except that we didn't make up an emergency or anything. At this point my hissy fit was in full swing and a few tears started to fall as Ben remained patient and calm.

That's when Atlanta tipped the scales from being just a typical frustrating airport to the worst of the worst. As I silently started to cry the lady at the Delta counter got ON THE INTERCOM and announced to the entire boarding area that there was no crying in her terminal. And EVERYONE in the vicinity turned to look at me as I immediately burst into tears.

So that about wraps up that leg of the trip, except to say that we went back and stood in line for over 3 hours, only to be given hotel vouchers for the night, only to discover that we still had to pay for half of the expensive hotel, only to also discover that they had booked us for the wrong flight the next day and also showed us taking off on the Copenhagen flight, causing Ben to have to leave the hotel and and catch the last shuttle to the airport to stand in line for another hour to have them fix their 15th mistake for the day.... But other than that Atlanta was great!

All I can say is that I could have kissed the shiny pristine floor of the Zurich Airport, that place was running like a Swatch watch. And everyone spoke English.