Travel day.

This is just going to be a quick recap, because it covers about 24 total hours of travel.

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Friday morning, as we were getting up having breakfast and cleaning so the house would be ready for us to leave, the baby threw up all over me. He was tested and found slightly feverish. He fell asleep on my lap.

This did not ease my nervousness. After some discussion, we elected not to change plans, except that we weren't going to feed him anything but breastmilk, and Mark and I quickly redistributed things in the bags to make room in the carryons for extra clothes, some receiving blankets, and paper towels. Also we took extra ibuprofen. On we go.

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Cab to the airport. My heart was absolutely pounding. I just had so much to keep track of, between children and bags. Mark carried the stack of seven passports and the tickets for the baby.

Once at the ticketing counter we rediscovered that the airlines seem not able to handle the "traveling with a lap infant" scenario. Every time it happens, it is as if no one has ever heard of this strange and obscure process. Much rapid, loudly clicking typing on the keyboard. Many additional agents called over to peer at the screen. Eventually the correct combination of boarding passes was issued for everyone except Mark, who only got his boarding pass for the first leg from Minneapolis to Boston. This enabled Delta to pass the buck to Air France.

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In Boston we got briefly lost because of a sign with directions that would have been correct had the sign been located elsewhere in the terminal, and then were alarmed to discover we had to go through security again to get to the international terminal, which Mark could not do without his boarding pass. So back to the ticketing counter we went, hungry and unable to pass through to where the restaurants were. We watched Mark waiting in line with several other families, all of whom were also, strangely, attempting to travel with their babies on their lap and being thwarted. Eventually the appropriate passes were issued and we struggled through security to wait there. We grabbed dinner in the food court at 9:15.

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Stepping onto Air France was instantly relaxing, though. The flight attendants greeted us in French and explained to me how to attach the "ceinture-bébé" to my own seatbelt so I could buckle the baby. The children were ecstatic about each of them having their own video screen with a choice of games and movies . Mark took the window seat and tried to sleep, since he has to do all the driving. I held the squirming baby. Everyone else was well pacified by the seatback screens. They brought dinner. Most of us skipped it, having just eaten. The 4yo wanted cake, so he got a dinner. The 14yo had a pasta with tuna sauce and said it was awesome. I managed to sleep a little, but not much. I don't think the 8yo slept at all. She was enraptured by her display. I decided not to complain.

In the morning they gave us a muffin and plain yogurt. I love plain yogurt. It was really good yogurt.

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At Charles de Gaulle we established camp in a commuter lounge, waiting for our flight to Turin. I shuttled children to and from the snack shop so they could buy drinks and candy. I suggested sandwiches but everyone just wanted candy. The 8yo was exhausted and dehydrated; you could see her wilting over the chairs. We made her drink lemonade, which she said was perfect, sour and not sweet.

I ate a cappacolla and emmental sandwich in the sort of a wedge-shaped plastic container that one buys gas station sandwiches in.

The flight was delayed due to an Italian ATC strike. We very nearly missed our flight because they put the announcement on a different board than the one we were watching; our names were up on yet another board with a "See the desk immediately" notice for who knows how long. But we made it on. That flight was only an hour, and with no seatback screens, the children slept.

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In Turin we recovered all our bags ... except the one with the 14yo and 10yo boys' clothes and alpine gear. Even if the bag is located and sent to us, this presents a bit of a problem because we had already hired a guide to take them out with Mark on the glacier for Monday. So Mark was fairly stressed out. By the time we finished at the baggage counter, and with the flight delay and then the rental car, we had barely any time to shop for groceries before the store closed. My new European SIM card claimed not to have a cellular data subscription (a problem that got fixed the next morning), and we had no map, and Mark's cell phone was nearly out of power, so finding our way to the Aosta grocery store in time was difficult. Happily, my 10yo had purchased a rechargeable power pack thing so that his iPod would never run out, and we quickly appropriated it to juice Mark's phone. As time ran out, I navigated, with Mark asking urgently "Left or right?" while I went "uh... it's a roundabout... let's see... you need to come out of it going almost but not quite left..." or "uh... neither... there are four straight aheads, you need to take the middle one on the right..."

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I will just skip to the important part. We got enough groceries for dinner, breakfast, and lunch, and we're still married.

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No, it's better than that. Mark's trip through the grocery store, I missed, because I was outside in the car nursing the baby. He took the 14yo and they ran through in twenty minutes, which I sort of imagine was like one of those game shows where people rush through supermarkets trying to spend as much as they can before the buzzer rings. We arrived back at our little apartment with wine and cured meats and cheese and a loaf of sourdough bread and Nutella and Wasa crackers and butter and jam and eggs and a brick of milk and three boxes of cereal (the 14yo reported that he was able to get directions to these by asking "Dov'è cornflakes?" , a feat of which he was quite proud).

We ate and drank and fell exhausted into bed. And in the morning there was this:

 

Mass this morning. More later.

 

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Comments

[Rebekka]

We just got back from Stockholm, first trip with our nr 2, who is now almost 9 months. It seems like every kid you add makes traveling exponentially more insane. I am so glad we did not try to go to the US this year.

Every time we fly, the airport service people insist that we have to try using the self service check in. It never ever works with a lap infant. And even if it did it wouldn't print out an extra tag for the stroller. Yet they insist.

Hope you solve the baggage problem - our travel insurance gives you a daily stipend for each day the bag is missing so you can get clothes etc, do you have something like that.

Have a lovely trip!

[bearing]

Mark is trying to rent alpine gear for the boys right now...

[Kelly]

We had a terrible time with our ticketing because of the lap ticket too. Delta blamed it on the fact that we were flying there without the infant and back with the infant but perhaps it's just a general problem. In the end I remember they printed us an infant lap ticket for the two flights we took to China even though we didn't have a ticket for that leg. That was the only way they could print the rest of the tickets.

[Jenny]

I hope baby is feeling better.

[bearing]

Oh, yeah, I should update that. Baby seems fine now.

[mandamum]

Yay! I was thinking I wouldn't hear from you again until you got back - such fun to "travel with" you :)

How stressful to lose a bag and have to navigate everything while on a time schedule. And closing stores...!! In another language! How exciting --good for your 14yo using his language skills!

I'm glad the baby is better.