Cruise to Nova Scotia, Part 6
Maine
to Memphis
June 11-15, 2004 (Updated Dec. 19, 2004)
By Lewis Nolan
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June 15, 2004 – Tuesday
We were up before 6 a.m.
so we could get an early start on the 2 ˝-hour drive from Scarborough, Maine,
to Boston. We wanted plenty of cushion to deal with the heavy traffic barreling
down the New England corridor of I-295, I-95 and I-93 and also the potential
snarls of congestion in and around Boston’s Big Dig tunnel system under
downtown.
Humpback whale "Platform" does fluke wave
Click Colored Type to Enlarge Photo
Breakfast at the Marriot
Townhome Suites was complimentary and Continental. Predictably, the Atkins
approach to eating hasn’t penetrated those who plan the meals for most business
travelers. I again went off program by eating a bagel with cream cheese (good)
and Betty got a small sack of bagels and granola bars to eat on the road.
We pulled out of
Scarborough at 7:30 a.m. on a cool and sunny morning. We’ve had incredibly good
luck with the weather this trip. The drive was the best kind, totally
uneventful. The scenery near Exeter, N.H., and the crossing over the Merrimac
River provided some exceptional views. Two perfectly shaped, old-style steel
bridges were in complete harmony with the clear river water, the rolling hills
and the leafy, hardwood trees.
We stopped at an Exxon
station on the outskirts of Boston to top the fuel tank for the Ford Explorer
we had borrowed from our son Casey. The gas was $2.14 a gallon for regular.
That’s the most I recall ever paying in the United States. We paid 30 cents a
gallon less the next day in West Memphis, Ark. The maps and directions Casey
gave us last week were quite helpful and Betty and I negotiated the busy,
fast-moving traffic through Boston and to Cambridge without a hitch. We pulled
into the HBS parking garage near Casey’s campus apartment at 10 a.m., well
ahead of schedule.
Betty’s bag of breakfast
goodies somehow got locked in the car once we unloaded our bags. We purposely
locked Casey’s car keys in the Explorer so he could retrieve them upon his
return early next week from Peru. He and three pals have been hiking about the
Inca ruins at Machu Picchu and other locations in Peru and Bolivia to celebrate
his graduation and the impending wedding of another trekker. Well, at least
Casey will have a stale treat waiting for him when he discovers the forgotten
snacks.
Per his advice, we caught
a taxi right outside the parking garage for the $35 ride to Boston’s Logan
Airport. Oddly, the fare hasn’t changed even though the drive now takes less
than half the time it did in recent years while the Big Dig construction
project was underway.
After seeing a mass of
humanity stalled at the airport security check station after our flight into
Boston last week, I had inquired about the congestion at an information kiosk
in the terminal. A nice lady advised us to arrive three hours early because
Logan security was overwhelmed.
We got to the airport at
11 a.m. and breezed through the checkpoint without delay. The screeners we
dealt with were far more polite than the boors we had encountered in the past.
Maybe they’ve been taking charm lessons in preparation for the upcoming
Democratic National Convention, which will nominate Massachusetts Senator John
Kerry as their candidate for President in late July.
With so much unplanned
wait time in the airport, we paid Delta Airlines $50 each to change our 4:45
p.m. flight to Atlanta to the 12:20 p.m. flight. Of course that guaranteed that
our new flight would be delayed. And it was when thunderstorms in the Southeast
scrambled the airline schedules. We boarded late and sat on the ground for 45
minutes. The big jet was completely full and we had middle seats on
separate rows. I’m glad we had a quick sandwich lunch in the terminal and
gladder yet that we carried half a sandwich onto the plane.
By stepping it out in the
Atlanta terminal, we caught a timely concourse tram and made it to the
also-delayed Delta connecting flight to Memphis with seconds to spare. Betty
asserted herself when a thoughtless, fellow-passenger tried to cram an
oversized bag into the overhead space holding Casey’s hard-won, expensive MBA
diploma. He backed off the face of a snarling mama bear.
Continuing the Nolan’s
long and nearly unbroken saga of airline screw-ups, one of our three checked
bags didn’t make it to Memphis. Fortunately, the bag showed up the next day and
was delivered to our front porch. In the rush to make the Atlanta-Memphis
connection, I left my prescription reading glasses and a favorite book, Patrick
O’Brian’s “Far Side of the World,” in an airplane seat pocket. I reported the
lost items and called Delta a couple of times but they never showed up.
After a $20 cab ride from
Memphis International Airport, we were home by 4 p.m. – several hours earlier
than originally planned. We unpacked and soon repaired to a nearby Mexican
restaurant for margaritas and a spicy dinner.
Despite the aggravation of
the flight delays and lost luggage, we had a great time. We will always
treasure the memory of seeing our son become the first in our family to
graduate from Harvard University, with a Master of Business Administration
degree from Harvard Business School. The magnificent sightings of three species
of whales in the Bay of Fundy will be in our minds for a long time. But I tend
to doubt that we will pass that way again unless Casey’s planned career path in
real estate development should take him back to the New England or we should
have connecting flights to Europe through Boston on some future trip.
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