Departure from USA
Trip Start
Jan 06, 2009
1
2
30
Trip End
Jan 30, 2009
Jamaica, New York
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Everyone arrived at Messiah College on time. The bus was 1/2 hr. early. We weighed our luggage, added gifts and textbooks to the lower weighted bags and loaded everything on the bus. Tony was our bus driver. He was a truck driver for 30 years and has since retired. He now works part-time for Red Lion Bus Company. Fortunately for us he was very familiar with New York so we arrived at JFK in only 4 hrs. We beat the traffic all together. The bus was very comfortable with a bathroom and a leather seated lounge in the back of the bus. One student got motion sick (we will prevent this on the way home = drugs).
We arrived at JFK on time; however, we could not check in until 6pm (4 hrs. before our departure). Students walked the airport, grabbed a snack and patiently waited for time to pass. Mana, Whitney & Janet met us at the airport prior to our check-in. It was perfect timing. All went well at check in except that my travel agent failed to correct the spelling of two student's names. Fortunately the corrected the problem and allowed them to board. It was not an easy process as normally they just rebook the passenger under their correct name; however, the plane was full and the computer would not allow the agent to book the students. Needless to say, the travel agent was contacted. Upon gate arrival we noticed that there was only one place to grab dinner so we all ate at the Pannini Express. The food was good but expensive. We boarded the plane around 10:35 pm.
The plane was full and we were not grouped together. We were spread out slightly as I requested aisle seats and exit seats. Unfortunately, we only had aisle seats. Also, we found out that you can not trust website information. The seats did not have foot massages, there was one common TV screen for everyone instead of individual TV screens, and the movies were not popular nor interesting. The seats were at least big enought to accommodate American sized people. The food was good. We were served a hot meal about an hour after take off. We had either chicken & rice or beef & potatoe, roll, raw salmon & cole slaw and a chinese cake for dessert. Every few hours water in a 4 oz dixie cup was served along with juice, wine, coffee or tea. After we were finished eating the lights were turned out and we were to sleep.
