We had breakfast and we all made sure we had each other’s emails.  We are in no big hurry to get off this ship because our flight doesn’t leave for Rio until 2 p.m.  Conrad has arranged for a taxi to come down to the pier and pick us up – we will have to pay the Port Charge again, but it beats dragging our suitcases up a bumpy steep ramp for several hundred yards.    We share the ride with George and Charlene,  Ann and Patti have a pre arranged ride – we had asked about obtaining a transfer but was told it would be more expensive than the taxi.  We got to the Manaus Airport way early and had to wait to check in.  We were waiting in line on our trip to Manaus when someone told us that seniors have priority, so we stepped up into the priority line and were in the first group to board.  It would be nice if every country did this.  We don’t fly that often, who knows, maybe they do.  It was a rough four hours back to Rio and then we had to go through Passport control and security and then wait for our plane.  We ran into all our dinner mates again – we all had different flights but we all ended up in the same place – the Rio Airport. 

We boarded our plane around 9 p.m. and arrived in Atlanta nine and half hours later.  It was a very rough and tumble flight.  Luckily they had pillows, blankets and eye covers and earplugs for us, along with a wonderful tv screen with all sorts of games, movies, etc., etc.  Russ watched movies and read the news, I covered my eyes and slept.  We all seemed to wake up a couple of hours before landing – they gave us some stuff to eat – can’t really say I know what it was – dinner the night before was much better.

We arrived at 5:30 Eastern Standard Time and went through processing – we had been told our luggage would go straight through to Springfield but when we got to Atlanta we had to pick it up from the luggage carosel and take it over to another point and drop it off – it wasn’t inspected or anything – weird.  Then we had to go get in line and stand forever.  There were no signs saying that you had to use a different bucket for each of your electronic devices so the delay was immense; everyone was doing it wrong – no signs, no instructions, so how was anybody to know.  I sailed through okay, but Russ got caught up in the same thing.  We finally made it through and then had to wait for several hours for our flight to Springfield, it leaves at 9:40 and is a couple of hours to home.

This was our best flight – we even had more leg room than on the other two planes.  Yeah!  We arrived safe and sound and picked up luggage, called Uber and arrived home by noon. 

HOME SWEET HOME!