March 8, 2008 -- Saturday

Originally I had planned a 4-day get-away to So-Cal for February, but plans change and I decided to apply my airfare credits to an all new trip: a little 3-day walkabout of New York City.

I had been to NYC three previous times, but I had never stayed and lingered in the City for more than an 8 hour perusal. This time I booked a room right in mid-town Manhattan and planned to dig in a bit deeper.
Today was travel day. I arrived at Calgary International Airport at 6:15am plenty early for my 8am flight to San Francisco. Yes, San Francisco (SFO), because that's the logical connection town for flights going from Calgary, Alberta to New York City. Upon arrival over the San Franciscan skies our captain let us know that the reason we were making repetitive loops from the Golden Gate Bridge, then out over the Pacific and back was because SFO was not letting planes land for reasons even our captain was unsure of. The speculation was that there was heavy fog, but I could see clearly all the way to the Bay Bridge, so who knows.

After about 8 loops out to sea and 45 minutes of delay we had to re-route to land in Sacramento to re-fuel. It was a beautiful, clear day on the Sacramento tarmac as we sat in our diminutive Canadair Regional Jet seats for an hour before taking-off yet again for SFO. We looped out to sea only three times this go-around before finally landing at a perfectly clear-skied San Francisco.
My transfer flight to NYC had been missed in the delays so I was re-booked for a new flight that was to leave only 30 minutes after arriving in SFO. I got on my new flight and we quickly wheeled out onto the runway to queue-up behind 20 other jets. When our turn to take-off came, we instead wheeled back slowly toward the concourse gate. The captain informed us that the reason we were not departing from SFO was that JFK Airport in New York was not letting planes land! Judas!

As it turned out there were huge winds and rains blowing into Manhattan due to effects from a monster blizzard hitting the Great Lakes region at that very time. Gusts of up to 65 mph were being experienced throughout the day. We wound up being led off the plane and back into the terminal to wait another 2-1/2 hours to see if the weather would change enough to fly into Manhattan. I ate a whole 12" Firewood Cafe Margherita pizza while I waited.

Pretty good pizza actually--I learned that this basic thin crust, red tomatoes, green basil and white cheese pizza is named after Margherita Maria Teresa Giovanna di Savoia, the Queen Consort of Italy from 1878-1900.

When we finally did set off flying I slept most of the flight, having the comfort of three seats to myself. I woke up long enough to notice the lights of Chicago passing by my window as we proceeded eastward over Lake Michigan. Once over the Long Island skies we began a very, very bumpy and prolonged, loopy descent toward JFK Airport.

We looped out over the Atlantic 3 or 4 times after a few failed attempts at penetrating the heavy winds blocking our path to the airport. I became quite nauseous and starting sweating heavily as I fought-off the need to return my SFO pizza as property of United Airlines. A few ladies in nearby seats finally started retching violently and I was only saved by a glimpse of a lighted runway some miles ahead in the bobbing, weaving night horizon. I figured if they could just hard land this craft on THIS go-round that, maybe, I could keep that SFO pizza to myself afterall. My luck held as the pilots made the daring descent into the winds. Our little jet fought to stay balanced as we came in to land. Then, BAM.....we pounded down with our wings tipping prominently to either side as we slowed to taxiing pace. What a relief! I was soooo motion sick from this flight! We parked at our gate at about 1:15am NYC time. I was supposed to arrive at 7pm NYC time, so I was delayed a full 6 hours.
I was to meet my nephew Kelly this evening at 9pm at La Guardia Airport until the delays came about. Through text messages I told him to head out to our hotel ahead of me since I didn't know the extent of my airline delays. He managed to get in to our room at Thirty Thirty Hotel NYC (30 East 30th Street, NYC -- see photo above) by about 10pm and even hooked up with a friend that was attending NYU this semester--they went off to eat and play in Greenwich Village while I was bouncing around in the Atlantic skies.
I paid $55 to a Yellow cabbie to drive the 14 miles from JFK to the hotel. I arrived sometime near 2am--Kelly arrived back from the West Village by cab a little while later. We didn't settle in for the night at our 7th Floor room until around 3am, so we pretty much ruined our chances of having an early start the next day.