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Blog is based on a trip we took to Hawaii from Dec. 16, 2007 to January 12, 2008
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- three photos have been added to Blog 77
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How Not to Leave on a Trip

I love traveling but I detest the process of getting ready to leave for a trip.

My former career as a high school teacher in Ottawa offered plenty of opportunity for travel during the summer months.

More often than not, my destination of choice was France and other parts of Europe.

For that reason, I have the fondest memories of Mirabel International Airport in Montreal since it served as my gateway to Europe for many years.

A super-airport, located 55 kilometers north of Montreal, it was opened with great promise for international air traffic in 1975.

It was huge, architecturally innovative and extremely user-friendly once you got there. That was the problem, getting there. It sat in the middle of nowhere, a one hour drive from Montreal and two hours from Ottawa.

Nevertheless, I developed a Pavlovian response to Mirabel Airport. To this day, the mere mention of Mirabel evokes memories of some of the best times of my life spent in Europe.

If you look in an illustrated dictionary for the phrase "white elephant", you may see a photo of Mirabel International Airport.

The volume of Mirabel's air traffic started to decline only a year after its opening. A major reason was the unsustainable one hour bus transfer time for passengers switching from an international flight at Mirabel to a domestic flight at Dorval Airport, located much closer to downtown Montreal. A promised rapid transit rail connection between the two airports was never constructed.

Another factor was the increased range of newer aircraft. This allowed foreign carriers to fly directly to the mecca of Canadian airports - Pearson International Airport in Toronto, without refueling in Montreal.

In addition, Montreal went into a period of economic decline in the '70's and '80's due to the political situation based on linguistic and ethnic grounds.

This all led to less traffic and the eventual demise of Mirabel.

Mirabel was effectively closed down to scheduled passenger traffic in 1992. That was the end of a wonderful era. For a while it limped along as a charter flight airport but for several years now it no longer carries out its vocation as a passenger airport.

So while Mirabel Airport brings back wonderful memories of being the start of exciting travel experiences, there is a dark lining to the silver cloud.

The dark lining in this case is bad memories associated with the stress of getting ready for my trips and getting to the airport on time.

So what were the factors that made my departures so stressful?

My trips were multifaceted.

Since a part of each summer in Europe was devoted to bicycle touring, my touring bike and all the equipment had to be packaged in a bicycle box for air transport. It was a struggle to get an appropriate box, not to mention disassembling the bicycle to get it to fit into a box and then stuffing the rest of my bicycle equipment into the box. Endless packing tape around the box would then hopefully ensure that the box would arrive in Europe undamaged.

Since I almost never stayed in hotels, the camping equipment was of prime importance. That meant water-proofing the tent and making sure the rest of the equipment was up to the task.

Then there was the usual month of language study in France which required a little brushing up on grammar rules forgotten over time.

More often than not, the house had to be prepared to be occupied by other parties during my absence. There was a lot of work associated with that.

For a number of years, I had a part time business called Euro-Immersion Language Study. Its purpose was to facilitate language study in European universities during the summer months.

That required a lot of preparations before my leaving for Europe.

By the time it came down to actually packing my personal affairs, there was usually very little time left because of the pre-occupations mentioned above.

I can't remember the number of times that I would be on my way to Mirabel Airport and due to a rapid last minute departure from home, wonder if I locked the front door to the house.

It doesn't end there. I also have two recurring dreams (or nightmares) in my life.

In one scenario I know that I have a ticket to fly away on a trip but I can't find the ticket and I don't know which airport I am leaving from.

In a similar scenario, I am working as an occasional teacher who has a class to cover but can't find where the class room is located.

Due to the multi-faceted nature of my trips, I have never enjoyed the luxury of just packing a few items in a suitcase and leaving for a trip.

Oh yes, I forgot to mention, I am a pack-rat.

Other people may be able to grab a few items and a tooth brush and leave - not me.

I am obsessed with the idea that "no item that I might need should be left behind".

Part of the problem already starts with the need for daily medication and glasses which of course have to be backed up by contact lenses as part of the survival gear. From there, it only gets worse as preferably all possibilities must be prepared for.

Then there is the age factor.

In case you are wondering, I retired from high school teaching in Ottawa in 1999.

As one grows older, slower and stupider, everything takes more time. That is a huge problem which complicates the whole process of leaving on a trip.

I am a list person.

I have a long standing tradition of relying upon lists. When you have that kind of mentality, the list tends to grow instead of shorten. This makes the departure line even more menacing.

A couple of years ago, it fell upon my good friend Wilf Schwarz from Ottawa to drive me to Ottawa International Airport for a trip to Argentina (by this time, Mirabel was closed).

Once again, panic set in as I realized that I would not make it out the door in time. There were still too many items on my to-do list. In a panic I called Wilf to come over an hour earlier to help get me out the door. His last act was to vacuum the place before we left for the airport while I was still stuffing underwear into my suitcase.

Over the years, the only relief from all this has proven to be the great feeling of relaxation that comes with the aircraft taking off. At that point there is no turning back so why worry!

Our departure for Hawaii followed this well established tradition of nail biting, stress filled departures.

It left me thinking, this is no way to leave on a trip.

Our flight with Air Canada Jazz from Prince George, BC to Vancouver on Sunday, December 16, 2007 departed at 11:00.

That should have left us with plenty of time if you start packing early, like the day before.

Once again I was the victim of the "to-do" list.

Very few of the items on the "to-do" list had any connection with the trip. They were just items which I felt had to be completed before leaving.

Most of the preceding week I was working as an occasional teacher which also infringed on my time to attack the To-Do list.

Unfortunately, the evening before our departure I was overtaken with "the need to blog".

Prince George was once again threatened by an overflowing Nechako River. Its flood waters were menacing an industrial area along River Road as well as residential areas built on the flood plain. It became a story that was even covered in the national news, and I just had to add my two cents worth in a blog. (see Travelogue: Prince George - Blog No. 22 - Flooding on the Nechako River - Round 2.

No wonder I have difficulty leaving for the trip. That evening should have been spent packing my suitcase.

Instead it was left for the next morning. As I said, packing a suitcase is slow when a pack-rat has to decide what to take and what to leave.

An 11:00 departure meant that we had to leave from home about 09:30 which did not leave an extraordinary amount of time under the best of circumstances.

I haven't said much about Barbara but she just came back on the previous Friday from her most recent work related trip, so her time was incredibly tight to get ready for this trip.

Since she has a lot of experience in packing due to her frequent trips, Barbara reassured me that there was no problem that she would be ready in time.

On the morning of our departure she announced that she "just had to drop by the office to take care of a few things". That was not good news considering how little time we had.

Throughout all this, our plan was to take a taxi to the airport. Being as busy as both of us were, ordering a taxi was something we left to the last minute. Given my experience in Ottawa, ordering a taxi at the last minute was generally not a problem. Well, this is not Ottawa. Firstly, when I got around to calling, one of the two taxi companies in town did not answer their phone and the other company indicated that they had no taxis available for at least another 45 minutes.

That squarely placed it in the "too late" category. Meanwhile, Barbara had left to go to the office with all her baggage standing by the door for me to take upon leaving. (It's a six minute walk to her office.)

I again tried calling the first taxi company which continued their good business practice of not answering the phone.

I now know that the departure of a flight at the local airport may put a serious dent in the availability of taxis in this town.

Time was seriously ticking down. Here I was with my baggage, Barb's baggage and several bags of garbage which had to be dropped off at the dumpster.

Since I did not want to bother any of our neighbours to drive us, there was only one choice - drive our car to the airport. So what if we would be gone for 27 days and would have to pay for 27 days parking at $6.00 per day!

All the while I had something else in the back of my mind. We were leaving for 27 days and we had made no arrangements for anyone to empty out our mailbox or the mailbox of another neighbour we had promised to look after.

What to do?

In desperation I knocked on the doors of our immediate neighbours only to be met with no response to my desperate knock.

Running out of time, I was struggling to get the baggage and garbage in a piece-meal fashion to the elevator and garage level without forgetting anything along the way.

Meanwhile I managed to give Barbara a call and share the good news with her. We decided to leave a second set of car keys on her office desk in the hopes that one of her co-workers would have time to go to the airport and return the car to our indoor parking space.

Needless to say, on the way to the airport, there was a fair amount of self-recrimination. I won't even mention the recrimination that was coming from my right side as my travel partner felt the need to get a few things off her chest.

Oh yes, perhaps I forgot to mention, I also have a propensity to procrastinate but that's another story.

As I said, this is no way to leave on a trip but on the other hand, it continues a well established legacy that is driving me crazy!!!

Once again, the only saving grace was the feeling of utter relief as the roar of the engines and the G-force pushing our limp bodies into our seats signaled that good times were just ahead.


Epilogue:

At the airport I managed to get a prime parking spot which would make the car easy to find. Thankfully on the third day, one of Barbara's co-workers was able to get the car and park it in our nice warm parking spot for the next 24 days.

We never did manage to get a mailbox key to a neighbour resulting in an overstuffed mailbox 27 days later, including Christmas mail.

Coming Soon: Waikiki Beach - Day 1
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Real Time: February 6, 2008

Check the Vancouver Travelogue for:

Blog no. 9 - From Lillooet to Whistler
Blog no. 10 - Whistler a World Class Ski Resort
---- more blogs to come from Vancouver