Planes, Trains & Automobiles

To start this new post I figured I would give the details on how I arrived in Europe and how I reached my destination.
I left Minneapolis on June 20th at 11am. I had on stop on the way to London and that was in Toronto. I sat in Toronto's airport for 3 hours until my plane for London showed up. A quick side note, I took Air Canada from Minneapolis to London and let me tell you, I ate the best airplane meal plus got a complimentary glass of wine to go with my dinner. I arrived in London, Heathrow Airport, on June 21st at 6 o'clock in the morning. From Heathrow I took a bus to get to Stansted Airport where I took another plane to get to Germany. The bus left Heathrow at 11am and got to Stansted shortly before 1pm/13:00. However my plane for London to Germany didn't leave until 7pm/19:00 so I sat at that airport for 6 hours. Luckily I brought a movie with me to Europe because I bought a movie that can only be played in European countries. I did not read the fine print before purchasing it. I purchased a ticket from London to Duesseldorf from RyanAir which is like AllegiantAir in the states. The problem with RyanAir is that the fly out of airports that are in the middle of nowhere. So when I arrived in "Duesseldorf," I still had to take a bus then a train to get to the city of Dusseldorf. I did not know this until I arrived in "Dusseldorf." I meet some wonderful people while I was trying to figure out how to get to Duesseldorf. We met under similar circumstances, we didn't know exactly how to get to Dusseldorf. It was a bonding experience. Eventually I found someone who knew what they were doing and going. I finally got to the city of Duesseldorf right before midnight. You maybe think is she done with her traveling yet and the answer is no. I still needed to get to Bendorf where I am staying right now. So I sat at the train station for 3 hours to take it to Koblenz. Once again I met some locals. One man put headphones on my head to listen to some music. I quite enjoyed the music. It had a bit of funk to it. I arrive in Koblenz at 5am waited to talk to the train station to find a train to Perpignan, that is another story. I took a taxi to Bendorf and finally arrived to my designation on June 22nd at 7am. Next place on the list in France.

Oh How I Love Cruise Control!!!

I was suppose to take a train from Whitefish, Montana, to St. Paul, Minnesota. It would have been a 22 hour train ride and I would get to Minnesota on time for my sister's High School Graduation, however the train got cancelled due to flooding on the tracks. The next train leaving Whitefish would have been on June 4th, but my sister's graduation was on June 3rd. So I decided in less then 24 hours that I would rent a car and drive myself across Montana, North Dakota and most of Minnesota. Here is what I had observed along the way:

• First off, the car I had reserved did not have cruise control. So I decided to pay $20 extra to get a car that had cruise control and let me tell you that was the best investment I had made in awhile. With changing the cars, I didn't get on the highway until 7am on June 1st.
• I drunk caffeine to jump start my system, however I only last an hour and a half into the trip before I had to use the restroom. 
• One game I played was the ABC game. If you don't know what that is let me explain. It is where you spot letters while you are driving but you have to go in alphabetical order. I just want to say I won that game.
• Within 3 hours of my trip I got flipped off. I was really worried that I was going to get flipped off checked off on my list of "things to do while you are on a road trip." Luckily I did and had 16 hours to spare. P.S. I don't think I deserved it.   
• I kept track of the different license plates I passed (not including semis) on my travel. Here is the list: New York, Colorado, Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Washington, Oregon, Kansas, Kentucky, Iowa and the most unlikely license plate I saw was Alaska. 
• The last think I want to mention about my road trip are the pet peeves I have. Pet peeve number one; semi-trucks, they go too slow for me and I hate when there are two semis, one in the left lane and one in the right. Actually, slow cars in the left lane period. People that don't know how to merge onto a highway. And the last thing that is worth mentioning is ROAD CONSTRUCTION where one minute I am cruising along going 80mph and have to drop to 40mph. I don't like it. 

TTFN