A Few More Hours With The Fam......Then Off To LAX

Friday morning, everyone's still asleep. Not for much longer I'd guess. We get picked up at 1pm for our private shuttle to LAX, allowing for possible Socal traffic, and our 6:30 departure for Istanbul. 13 hours in the air, 2 1/2 hour lay over, then 6 hours to Delhi with an arrival at about 4:30am on October 1.

We decided to spend the day and night in Majnukatilla, the Tibetan "ghetto" of Delhi, an hour car ride from the airport, and a place we've stayed several times before. Hotel reservation in place, car to be waiting for us at the airport. 

We could have chosen to stay near the airport for convenience sake, but that would be in an uninviting location for roaming around, meaning we'd be holed up in our room for over 24 hours til our 11am(?) flight on the 2nd up to Dharamsala. Staying in Majnu we get to a familiar place with good walking and good eating options, and we can begin our transition to being in India more pleasantly.

Here's a bit more of little (and he is little) Eden.........(oh, and I just heard him announce his awakening, quite clearly!)......

Maybe Terra and Joe will go out by themselves for breakfast this morning while the grandparents stay with Eden? They're still deciding. Of course they need time together, which they of course aren't getting. Ah.....only one of the many challenges of new parenthood.......but what do we know? ..........

 They won't be going, so we'll be saying goodbye to Joe as he leaves for work, and then hang out with mom and baby til we all leave for our different journeys at 1pm.

More to come from LAX............

Door to door luxury ride to LAX, my "carry on" suit case deemed too heavy, so now it's checked to Delhi: fingers crossed.

Through security with no problems, after....and this is a first.....going three by three past the drug sniffing, circling German Shepherd.

 Hmmm.

Text message and email from Turkish Airlines informs me that our flight is delayed 1 1/2 hours. First thought of Nancy's: what about our connection from Istanbul to Delhi, with only about a 2 1/4 hour layover?

Well, we're traveling now, and it's all out of our control. Ahhh. One breath at a time. So I'm waiting a half hour for our $25 gluten free airport pizza, since we now have another 4 hours to wait.....assuming the plane does leave by 8pm.

We'll see.

At the gate, the plane is here but it's 730pm and no one has yet boarded. We've been told that if we miss our connection to Delhi that Turkish Airlines would pay for a hotel if necessary and arrange a new flight. As long as we get to Delhi before, oh, say 8am on the 2nd, we'd still make our flight to Dharamsala.

My crossed fingers are beginning to ache.