Travel Day — Leg One to Atlanta

Thursday — April 2

Greetings from the Delta Airlines Crown Club at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL). I’m on my own at the moment. Mui’s in one of the phone cubbies, doing a job interview that came out of nowhere. In fact, there were two interviews that popped up suddenly on Tuesday. He managed to get one scheduled for yesterday and agreed to do the other one as a phone interview during our layover in Atlanta today.

But I am getting ahead of myself — let me go back to the beginning of our travel day.

You’d think that a 10:00a flight would mean that we’d sleep in for a bit this morning. But no; we were up at our usual time … 4:00a for Mui; 5:00a for me. The cab was at the door at 7:00a and 30 minutes later we were at Delta’s first class check-in counter at Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD). No, we weren’t trying to avoid the regular check-in lines. For once, we managed to snag first/business class award tickets — hence the access to Delta’s Crown Club, which, in light of Mui’s interview, turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

We begin our travel day with overcast and drizzle at Dulles International Airport.

Flight 1295 took off on time and was uneventful. In fact, the only hiccup thus far today was having to switch mobile lounges at IAD when the first one developed an engine problem as it was departing the main terminal. The first class seats on the MD-88 were quite comfortable – not too deep for my short legs. Service was minimal for the short flight — some snacks and drinks. For a while there, I wasn’t sure we’d get any service at all; it was a bumpy flight all the way to Atlanta.

We landed at ATL a few minutes after our scheduled time to find the weather similar to what we had left behind in DC — overcast and dreary. The pilot wasn’t joking when he said we would be landing on the runway farthest from the terminals; we had a long taxi to reach concourse T. Nor was he kidding when he said that our arrival gate was the farthest one out; we had a considerable hike to the underground rail system that connects the concourses. To keep the trend going, we stayed on the train until the last stop – concourse E.

After dropping off our carry-on bags at the Crown Club, we went to get a bite of lunch. Concourse E has only two sit-down eateries – a sushi restaurant and a TGIF; the rest of the eateries are in the food court. Since I prefer my fish cooked and not raw, we ended up at TGIF. A couple of appetizers proved to be plenty for us.

Time to wrap things up and go to the gate for our Lima flight … more later.

Next Up: Travel Day — Leg Two En Route to Lima