I'M ON VACATION! part one

So we just got back from Newfoundland.  It was a 10 day trip to visit John's family. And yes, it was lovely, people were seen, places were visited and events were....uh....done...unfolded? whatever, let's talk about the trip itself.  For those of you how have never been to Newfoundland, take out your atlas, I'll wait, now find the page that reads "Middle of Nowhere, North Atlantic Section" and there you have it.  If the gods are smiling at you, you can find a flight with only one stopover for under $1000. If you're using air miles, it gets a little trickier.  The best route would take us through Boston; the boys have never been to Boston so John thought we'd send a day there on the return trip.  So our itinerary looked like this:

Oakland --> Salt Lake City --> Boston --> Halifax --> St. Johns Newfoundland

Return Route:
St. Johns Newfoundland --> Ottawa --> Boston (via Air Canada)
Boston --> L.A. --> Oakland (via Delta)
(The carriers will become important later on.)

So the flights out were uneventful once you get past the 6:00 am take-off out of Oakland. The problems started to emerge when we arrived at Boston Logan International Airport. Now I don't know what Canada did to piss off Mr. Logan of Boston but I suspect it had something to do with hockey.  The architects, engineers and city planners designed and built a beautiful airport then said, 'Oh shit, we forgot Air Canada. No worries, we'll stick it down here by the parking garage and call it Terminal B (B for bullshit) Oh, but wait, they'll have to exit security so we'll need another checkpoint. Okay, let's see, we'll put it in this doorway, throw up a partial wall and have them line up down the hallway. (I am completely serious.) Okay, okay, that'll work but it's a rather long walk should we put in a moving sidewalk? No, fuck em. In fact let's make them check in again at a ticket counter and we'll make the ticketing area really pretty so they'll think everything is okay but it's not because we'll have all three Air Canada gates shoved in a corner that really only accommodates one gate and we'll have five flights departing within 45 minutes of each other and, wait for it, one gate agent. Should we provide some type of food and beverage service? Jesus Christ, Jillian, you're such a bleeding heart, this is why we don't promote women. Fine, we'll give a couple of coolers and a sketchy guy at the register who keeps going in and out of the service closet for god knows what reason and hey, that will create another ill placed queue so well done, Jillian, well done.

Ladies and Gentleman, I give you Boston Logan's Air Canada Gates:

Note the pile of empty cardboard boxes and the saddest, dirtiest American Flag you've ever seen. Why is there an American Flag at the gate when no where else in the country are there flags at international gates? Because, fuck you, Canada.

The flight was, naturally, delayed so we arrived at the Halifax airport with very little time to make our connection and had to run from one end of the airport to the other. This became a recurring theme.  If there was a medal event for running the length of as many airports as possible during one vacation, we would be Team USA.

So we left Oakland at 6:00 am and arrived in Newfoundland at 2:00 am.  Bright and fresh and ready to start our vacation, with the in-laws.