Our return from Spain. A long rant to match our long travel days.

Today we returned from Asheville after 34+ hours of travel. Never fly US Airways if you can help it. Never. Ever. We (along with many other travelers we spoke with) are seriously unimpressed and disgusted on so many levels, most of which I won't talk about here. (Side rant - Airlines based out of the USA don't seem to give a rats ass about people traveling with children. They only care about the people that get to enter the plane from the "other" side of the rope. Seriously, what is that?! We have tried to enter from the "other" side so many times just for kicks because the whole concept is completely absurd. We just laugh as they tell us we can't because we aren't first class, envoy, or whatever other crazy names they can come up with. Is it really that big of a difference to board the plane on the other side of some silly rope. I think not. You all end up at the same place: the person scanning your ticket. HA!)

Yesterday morning we flew from Jerez to Madrid and then boarded our 9 (gulp) hour flight from Madrid to Philly. Holy moly as if that wasn't hard enough, we arrived in Philly a half hour late and (unbeknownst to us the chaos) of traveling was about to begin...

Snow was beginning to fall in Philly. We were prepared for this fact because when we checked our flight information on Wednesday it said "travel advisory" to a list of cities that were expecting weather, Philly included. SO we do the responsible traveler thing and call the airline (because that is what the website told us to do to change our flight due to weather.) BUT when Tony called US Air, they said nothing was happening and no changes needed to be made. Well dumbass lady on the phone, of course nothing was happening, the storm wasn't set to hit until the following day. (Communication breakdown # 1 on behalf of US Airways. Aye.)

So anyhoo, we arrive in Philly, stand in line for ages to through customs, get our luggage, go through another part of customs, re-check our luggage, and then proceed to get in line with hundreds of other people to go through security. (While waiting in the security line the fire alarm goes off but no one moves because darn if no one wanted to give up their place in the insanely long line to "proceed to the nearest emergency exit". Ironically enough the two people working that I could see at this time (we weren't close enough to the actual security area to see anyone else working there) just shrugged their shoulders. One even grabbed her things and left because her shift was over. No direction, no help. NADA. Woa seriously?! What if there had been a real fire?

So we finally get through security and proceed to our gate to find out (not a surprise) that our 6:30pm flight to Charlotte had already departed because it was, um, 6:30. Damn lines. Everyone else on our flight (and a few other international flights that arrived around the same time) were all in the same boat. We got re-booked on the 8:40pm flight. No biggie. Time to grab food (or not because as far as I can tell the part of the Philly airport we were in sucked.)

Shortly after 9pm we finally board our flight. And then proceed to sit on the plane both at the gate and near the de-icing machine for FIVE (yes, 5) HOURS. With two small kids. Are you trying to make me go insane??? The girls actually slept for a significant amount of the time but still I had to hold a sleeping baby for that damn long. In a tiny plane seat.

We were apparently waiting in line for the de-icing machine. And then by the time we were second in queue (which took an eternity), the flight crew had maxed out on their hours and were not allowed to fly. (Come on US Air, you didn't see that one coming?!?!)

So we returned to the gate to switch out crews (or so the staff could talk in circles) but by the time things were figured out, the cross winds had increased to the point where no more flights could take off. At this point it is 2am.

During this LONG process, Akilah had fallen asleep and accidentally peed herself. Poor thing! I had to wake her up and get her to put on my fleece shirt and make her a skirt out of an airline blanket. (When I went to the back of the plane to ask for the blanket the person I spoke with found me one but not without attitude because technically he was no longer working. Ass. Seriously? Well, now your plane seat and perhaps below it are covered in pee. Take that.

We then (at 2:30 am) had to stand in line to get placed on another flight (along with the 200 other people). This is the point at which Tony lost it to some US Airways employees just standing around with their heads up their asses, watching all of us standing in a really long line after sitting on a non moving plane for 5 hours. (I had mentioned something about phone numbers to call to speak with customer service because the line was absurd.) After bitching these folks out, they FINALLY started handing out business cards with the phone number to call. Communication did not break down among these US Airways folks, it was never existent in the first place.

I could go on and on about how we then waited in line for an hour for a hotel voucher only to discover that the hotels were all full. (HELLO?! Couldn't they have ANNOUNCED that fact and not waste our time?)

Finally close to 4am we wandered to our next gate, picked up emergency blankets and water, and attempted to rest. HA! If we thought we were going to actually rest. At this point both girls were wide awake (it was 10am in Spain after all). Awesome.

Our 6:30am flight then boarded and we sat at the gate and at the de-icing machine for THREE hours before taking off.

In total we sat on a stationary plane for 8 hours before departing Philly for our ONE hour flight to Charlotte. Holy crap. It was beyond absurd.

Rant over. The end.