With the exception of an early-morning check in at the
crowded American Airlines counters in Phoenix, the airports we traversed – BLI, SEA,
ABQ – weren’t quite as busy as we’d found them on trips earlier in the
year. Maybe we were just lucky.
Airline lounges can be nice spots to relax, as we discovered
at SEA (Alaska Lounge) and PHX (AA Admirals Club). Coffee is a useful beverage when one has arrived late, taken a shuttle to a hotel with a Ma and Pa Kettle load of luggage, and returned to the airport about six hours later to check luggage in again.
Sometimes checking luggage works out. Yes, we had to check a
cooler and an insulated carton, both containing dry ice, in Bellingham,
in Phoenix, and again in Albuquerque on our return. It was relatively little fuss, and
the baggage handlers even managed a quick transfer from our incoming E175 at
SEA to our ongoing E175 while holding the plane for the four of us to make the
last flight of the day up to Bellingham.
Speaking of the E175, we really enjoy flying on the Embraer175, a 76-peassenger twin engine jet made in Brazil. It’s quiet and comfortable.
With 12 first class seats, upgrades are
available more than you might think. In fact, by signing up daughter Karen as
Kathy’s companion, and son-in-law Chuck as Brian’s, we scored upgrades for all
four of us on the SEA-PHX flight, and were otherwise seated in 2 x 2 Premium
Class seating, which isn’t bad at all.
We still enjoy flying. All five of our flights were pleasant to some degree, enough so that we booked an Alaska Hawaii sale flight to the Big Island the morning after we'd arrived home after Midnight.
