Who are we? Well most of us know who Lady H and I are. We used to be frequent posters to Nebo's threads. That's how we met Ponzi. We've yet to meet Ponzi, but I feel we've become really good friends through our postings here. We used to post frequently to Ponzi's TR's as well but work has gotten in the way.
Anyways, I've noticed some new posters here. Lady H is my wife Heather. She goes by Thumper_Man's Wife here on the Dis.
Most people here call me T_Man. Short for Thumper_Man. My name is Mike. Together most posters here just call us the Thumpers.
Ponzi is always kind enough to let us post a chapter or 2 about some of the adventures we just took. He wants to hear about how we got our travel vouchers so I'm going to try and write a brief chapter.
The day was Friday June 5, 2015. Lady H and I had been waiting for this day to come. As some of you may know, Lady H had won a trip to the Belmont Stakes in New York. For those that don't know, Lady H won a trip to the Belmont Stakes in New York. She won the trip from a local casino during the 2014 Belmont Stakes.
Lady H's bucket list included a trip to New York. A trip I thought we would have to save at least a couple of years for. Going to WDW and DLR has always set that trip back. Even the trip to Cancun last year pushed this trip back. When she won the trip though, we thought we would take advantage and make a whole vacation out of it.
Lady H won 2 roundtrip airline tickets, 2 nights hotel and 2 tickets to the 2015 Belmont Stakes. Since we had flights and 2 nights hotel, we knew we could easily spring for the remaining nights and take a week long vacation. We bought tickets for the various attractions we wanted to see while in NY during the months leading up to the vacation.
Anyways, as I stated, the day was Friday June 5th. Today was travel day to NY. Our flight was scheduled to leave the airport at 9:20am (MST). We would arrive in Dallas at 11:55am (PST), switch planes and depart to NY at 12:35pm (PST). We would land in NY at 5pm (EST), take a shuttle to Elmont, NY where we would stay 2 nights to attend the Belmont stakes. Take it all goes well.
Since I already said we landed up with travel vouchers, I'm sure you can guess all did not go well. We (Lady H, D'Sis and myself) get to the airport at 7:30am. My aunt and cousin whom are traveling with us are running late. We were hoping this would be the only glitch of the day. We decided we would check our bags, get through security and meet my aunt and cousin at the gate. Once we got through security, we have a normal routine of buying breakfast and drink for the plane. Soon my aunt and cousin would show up. We had about an hour wait still. Check the departure board, so far it looks like we're on time.
10 minutes later we notice the flight time changed on the gate. It now shows us departing at 9:50am. That's a half hour later than what we're supposed to leave. If you look at the times of our connecting flight, we had 40 minutes to de-board one flight and board the next. Now we only have 10 minutes. Once we noticed the change in time, we went to the customer service desk and asked about this delay and how it would affect our connecting flight. We were told they would hold the plane for us in Dallas and we would make our connecting flight.
No worries until we learn that the plane we were supposed to board was struck by lightning 3 time on its flight from Phoenix. Our 9:50am flight has now changed to 10:30am. The plane has been put out of commission for further inspections. They'll have to get us another plane. No way we're making our connection now. Back to the service desk. The attendant there knows we have connecting flight. Once again she assures us that we'll be fine. They have a plan in place to make sure we make our connecting flight. At the time they don't tell us what the plan is. We'll be given the details on our flight.
The plane we were going to use had been sitting out on the tarmac for a while. That plane also had a problem and they were working on fixing the problem. Flight time now changes to 11:25am. At 11:05am, our flight finally starts boarding. We're finally on our way, or so we thought. We hear an announcement that those passengers on flight so and so making a connection to La Guardia airport need to report to the service desk. We will not be making our connection and there are no additional flights to LGA from Dallas for the day.
Tired and frustrated, back to the service desk. Other passengers are already saying that we won't be able to leave until tomorrow morning. Others are stating we'll be flying to Chicago then catching a flight from there. My aunt is already fuming. Lady H and I are calm trying to figure out a solution. We are looking at the SWA site trying to figure out what flights are available we could possibly have them book for us. We finally mange to calm my aunt down. Told her we'll see what solution they offer and we'll go from there.
Turns out the passengers saying we're flying to Chicago were right. Only we wouldn't be getting a connecting flight to LGA that night. We would have to stay the night in Chicago and catch an early flight out first thing in the morning. We opted for this option. Southwest gave us a $200 credit voucher and put us up in a hotel in Chicago for the night.
Finally at 4:30pm (MST) we depart for Chicago and arrive there at 7:20 pm (PST). Our flight leaves at 6:20am in the morning. When we arrived, there was another couple that was traveling with us that told us to go to SWA counter and ask for the hotel closer than the one they were originally going to put us up in for the night. The attendant at first was reluctant, but he finally hooked us up given we were going to have to be back at 4:30am.
Once we go to the hotel, we're all hungry. There's a pizza place down the road within walking distance. We called and asked if they deliver as we were all getting a little tired and didn't really want to go anywhere. They said they do but it would be an hour and half for delivery. After a brief consensus, we agreed to walk there and eat. It was well worth the walk as it was one of the best pizza places we've ever eaten at. We told Smidgy later on and she confirmed we picked one of the best places.
We all had about a 4 hour nap by the time we finished eating and walked back to the hotel. We didn't want to miss the first shuttle back to the airport. We need to be on the first flight out in order to make it to the Belmont on time. Or would we.
We would. Just wanted to make you think their for a minute. Our flight left on time and we arrived in NY at about 9:20 (EST). I had to change the times for our shuttle pick up and we still needed to retrieve our luggage. Which we found to be a bit odd. Our luggage made it to NY the day before, why couldn't we. They had put it into their storage lockers for the night.
Soon we would be on the shuttle and on our way to the hotel where we would now only stay 1 night instead of 2. Since I had pre-paid in advance to get a discounted rate, I lost a night but glad we didn't lose the whole reservation. The hotel was booked for the night as the hotel was booked for the night with other people also attending the Belmont. Once we arrived, we were able to check-in, change and make it over to Belmont Stakes with plenty of time to spare. Getting there was rough but I'm glad we made it. The rest of the trip was smooth sailing.
Of course.
There you are!
But at least you mostly just got the backs of their heads.
I saw the movie and looked at the shops but totally missed the warriors which the boys would have loved. Wonder if it had anything to do with rushing out of there when Aidan got too fascinated with the replica swords. 
I got one during our previous trip because of all the DIS mentions but I was underwhelmed. And I like coconut.
And how did you know it was going to happen? Impressive. 
