Day 1

It’s amazing how much work it is to have company…even if after knowing each other for the last 23 years. After spending the whole morning picking up and cleaning my apartment, my Bostonian-speaking TomTom navigated me to the Zürich airport. “Park the car, you’re here!” was the final command as I missed the parking structure, reentered the freeway and took the airport exit from the other direction. Once parked, I headed for the arrival area. The Zürich airport is constructed around hundreds of signs directing travelers through a mess of shops, check-in areas, restaurants and parking structures, all under one roof! I eventually found my way the arrival area and was pleasantly surprised to learn that Heather’s flight had already landed, 45 minutes earlier than planned.

We made our way back through the labyrinth of signs and TomTom got us back to Rottweil. As we crossed the border back into Germany, the customs officer, who had checked most of the cars in front of us, winked and waved us through. I guess it helps to be female ;-)

I left San Diego around 11:30am and headed for Los Angeles. To my surprise, it only took a little over 2 hours to get to LAX. I checked my car into a long-term parking lot and was off to the airport. This was my first at the Los Angeles Airport. When they say to be at the airport 3 hours early for international flights, they mean it. All I can say is I’ve been spoiled when flying out of San Diego and Sacramento. LAX is one of the most inefficient airports I’ve ever experienced. For being one of the largest in the country, you would think they’d be more organized. After checking in and getting my boarding pass, I was directed to a roped off area where checked baggage was being processed. It took about 20 minutes of waiting at the front of the line for the baggage herders to shuffle bags around to make room for more. I felt uneasy about leaving my luggage in this makeshift corral. The next line was for security which had one person checking passports for about 30 gates.

Once on the plane, I wasn’t lucky enough to sit next to the hot Italian, but ended up sitting next to friendly, older woman who was traveling with her cats. One was in a carrier under the seat in front of her, the other with her husband. Gaby the cat, heavily tranquilized before the flight, started coming to on descent into Zürich. The meowing confused our neighbors and we got quite a few quizzical glances. Across the aisle from the cat lady, a very musically-moved, socially-awkward young man danced in his seat.

I think I must have brought San Diego weather with me because Zürich was warmer than I anticipated.

Back in Rottweil all hell had broken loose and our invitation to a BBQ became an invitation to an indoor dinner party. Regardless of the lightning and thunder, the home-cookin’ was great! Everybody at the party did their best to speak English, but after sparkling wine, French Merlot and a couple shots of schnapps Heather fell asleep with her eyes open and everybody else resumed in German. Around 11 I took Heather home, made up the bed and within minutes she was out.