"If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen." Well, the Nanny and I got out of the "kitchen" (St. Louis) and beat the heat last week with a getaway to St. Thomas. She won her sales trip and took me as her guest. Talk about a much needed vacation (we both slept for 12 hours the first night!)...we wanted to do nothing but eat, sleep and lay by pool. Happy to report, we were successful at all activities. The trip would not be complete without a little drama, which I'll get to later.
To start off, we knew the trip was going to be fun when the little boy in front of the Nanny gave us a scare and started grabbing at her pants. Granted, it was a 3 hr flight and he was probably getting bored, so he made friends with her through the seats.
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| The Nanny's "friend" on the flight. |
Finally (after a 5am departure to the airport), we arrived to St. Thomas safe and sound....
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| View from our room's balcony. |
If you're anything like me and the Nanny, you like to take spy photos. Let me explain....you act like you're taking a picture of someone, but really focus on the person/object behind them. Give it a try, it's a lot of fun, especially when you snap these gems:
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| Spy photo #1: Wow. |
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Spy photo #2: Ma'am, you should know better.
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When we weren't taking spy photos, we were at the pool. All day, under an umbrella, not getting a sunburn (but commenting on the burns of other guests) and enjoying the non-St. Louis weather.
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| A daily afternoon sighting...2 empty pina colada cups (one virgin, one not) and an empty snack tray (usually chips & guac/salsa). |
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| Our daily view from the pool. |
Did I mention that the Nanny's company gives each winner money on their hotel folio to spend on food and other hotel related expenses? This is how we were able to live like queens all week at the Ritz (trust us, we would have come home broke if we had to spend our own money!). Some of our favorite meals were the Quinoa Veggie burger (Oh. My. God.) and Salmon for dinner. I had to force myself to order something different on the 3rd night so our child isn't born with gills. With eating every meal on property, we were able to make friends with the waiters at the restaurants. Seeing them everyday and having them say hello to us kind of gave us insight to what it feels like to be rich and vacation like this all of the time.
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Must have made an impression with the Bleuwater staff...or spent way too much money.
Our "Come Back Soon" dessert tray compliments of the chef. |
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| View of hotel from lobby...our last view before heading home. |
When our trip was over, we headed to the airport. Our 4:40pm flight from St. Thomas to Atlanta took off without any problems. When we were mid-flight, the Captain came over the loudspeaker and told us that there was weather in the Atlanta area and that were circling around to approach the landing from the West, rather than the South. Sounded good to us, just get us to Atlanta on time, so we can make our connection and get home, right? Wrong. The Captain then came over the loudspeaker once more and notified us that we had been circling for awhile and did not have enough fuel to make it to Atlanta, so we were being diverted to Tallahassee. Huh? Where?!
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| We're going where?! Tallahassee?? |
As upsetting as it sounded, when you hear the words "running low on fuel" as you're sitting in the plane, you don't care where you land, just want to get more fuel! Now this diversion would have been fine and dandy if Atlanta was our final destination, but it wasn't. Our flight to St. Louis took off at 10pm, we landed in Tallahassee at 9:30pm. Crap. We knew we were stuck and without a flight. Ugh. Where was the airline going to put us for the night? How do you go from 5 nights at the Ritz Carlton St. Thomas to a crappy Atlanta airport hotel?
Enter Glenda. You see, when we landed in Atlanta (about 10:45pm, when no other flights were going anywhere), everyone else on the flight (and many other flights) was looking to be reconnected on another flight the following day, plus get a hotel room for the night. It was a mess. People upset/tired, kids crying (we thanked our lucky stars Marie was not with us, I felt so bad for these families with kids), and no instruction on what to do. I stood in line to hold our place while the Nanny went ahead to see what was going on. This is when she overheard Glenda (a wonderful Delta agent, yes, they do exist) say she could help a few people at a desk down the hall. The Nanny told me to come with her, so I reluctantly left the line and followed the Nanny, a few other travelers and Glenda.
We were the last people for Glenda to help. She was very sorry for our inconvenience and helped us get on the following morning's first flight. We then heard her on the phone booking us a hotel room. She said "oh no, I cannot, I will not put them there." We had no idea where "there" was, but if Glenda didn't want us to stay there, we didn't either. She got off the phone and told us that she would have a guilty conscience if she booked us where the airline wanted to put us, Motel 6, so she worked around things and got us a wonderful room at the Renaissance. Have you ever hugged a Delta agent? We did. Glenda deserved a hug and so much more for taking care of us. We took our reservation card and headed for the shuttle to the hotel. At this point of the night, it was midnight. We were exhausted, had not eaten a meal since lunch (snacks on the plane weren't cutting it for this pregnant lady) and just wanted to get to our non-Motel 6 hotel room. Then we saw the hotel shuttle area. Over 200 people waiting in chaos for their shuttle. It was mayhem. We waited about 40 minutes for our bus to come, then jumped on and headed to the hotel. After a quick sleep (about 4 hours), we were back at the airport on our way home. Thankfully. Breakfast at Starbucks in the airport never tasted so good. You know what else never tasted so good? Lunch at our new favorite cafe, Pastries of Denmark (try it, you'll thank me). So glad to be home, even it was 96 degrees with 110% humidity at 10am. Thanks for the trip, Nanny!
