After yesterday’s plane scare flying to Dallas, I slept in a bit in my Doubletree Wichita hotel room. I got in last night and was quite tired from the day’s events – literally mentally drained. I had a nice breakfast in the 5th floor Concierge Lounge, which was quite nice with hot and cold breakfast food. After breakfast I walked over to the car rental terminal at the adjacent Wichita airport, and rented a Malibu from National Car Rental.
I then drove to La Crosse, Kansas, which was close to a three hour drive thru America’s heartland. It was definitely thru some rural farmland areas, and not many places to stop for food, gas or shopping along the way. I took a couple photos on the rural drive: the wide open 2 lane roads past silos, windmills and oil rigs, and driving thru small towns with the outdoor garden shops displaying their colorful Fall pumpkin decor.
When I arrived at La Crosse, I was hoping to find a McDonalds or similar, but there was nothing of the sorts, in this small town. I worked late, until 8pm or so, and then drove to Hays City, about 30 minutes away, where I checked into the Hampton Inn for two nights. Compared to La Crosse, Hays City was like Manhattan, with lots of restaurants (2 Pizza Huts!) and several hotels. The Hampton Inn I stayed at looked to be the best in town, although there was a Holiday Inn Express, Best Western etc.
I didn’t do much during my two nights in La Crosse as I worked late both nights, and then had a half hour drive back to my hotel in Hays City. There was a beautiful full moon Tuesday night, but the store lights of the Home Depot next door took away from it’s beauty. There had been a ‘blood moon’ on Sunday and perhaps this is what made it so bright still two days later.
I checked out of the hotel this morning (Thursday) and worked most of the day in La Crosse,
before driving back to Wichita were I’m staying for the night.
I’m staying at the same Doubletree Wichita Airport, where I stayed on Monday night. I had left my Polo sweatshirt in my hotel room and had called the hotel Tuesday and asked them to hold it for me when I returned. I got my Polo sweatshirt back at checkin, and fortunately it wasn’t too cold this week when I might have needed it.
After checking in I made a couple work calls, and went up to the 5th floor Concierge Lounge which is complimentary as I’m a Hilton Diamond member. I checked in for my flight on American Airlines, which leaves at 9:15am. I still haven’t gotten an upgrade for tomorrow, which is a bit surprising considering I was upgraded already, but had to change airports/flights on Monday as a result of the emergency landing we made in New Orleans.
I did get an email from American Airlines apologizing for the ‘incident’ and inconvenience it caused, and gave me 10,000 miles for the trouble. I didn’t ask for that, and actually had written a complimentary letter for the flight attendants from the airport in New Orleans while I was delayed all day. It was a nice gesture, and I don’t think it was in anyway related to sending my complimentary email, but considering we could have crashed and spent a whole day of our lives in an unscheduled airport, a confirmed upgrade would have been the least they could do, especially for an Executive Platinum member who had already been upgraded on his original flight. Oh well, not a big deal, but more of a principal-type customer service thing.
Anyway, now it’s Friday morning and I’m back at the Wichita airport again, waiting for my 9:15am flight to Dallas, connecting to Orlando. Hope this travel day goes better than Monday!