My daughter chose to get married the Friday after Thanksgiving....................

I don't think she realized that it is a 20 hour flight/layover from Fairbanks, but I'm going and so it the spousal unit.....

ANY help would be welcome!!! We leave at 7 tonight - get this - Fairbanks to Anchorage to Chicago to Atlanta, rental car to drive to Birmingham. And I haven't been to Birmingham in 15 years.........

HELP!!!

It's warmer here than in Chicago (just about 2 degrees) and I HATE the busses they call airplanes (I work for a cargo/fuel/charter airline).

But I can't. It's my only kid, she's brilliant and beautiful, and I haven't seen her in years (4000 miles makes a difference!).

As for candygrams................. she registered at Bed, Bath and Beyond.

I went WAY beyond. Maxed out a credit card!!!

:hi:

:hi:

But if I were that good a mother, I wouldn't live 4000 miles away! (Email, IM and phones are the BEST!).

She's worth it. Owns a business, just got her Masters, totally rotten kid....................

She swears she's just like me.

n/t

n/t

Can I report him immediately? Or do I have to wait a few days? Hell, I fly outta there in about 2 1/2 hours! Hardly time for an..... ah,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, encoumter.

Besides, Beetwasher, I'm FEMALE. What the hell would a Repuke want with ME? (ROFL)

Good point! :rofl:

Money. Hear about our little scandals here? Now the feds are after Uncle Ted (Stevens) and his little boy...............

:rofl:

I have known many people who have missed their flights because they don't realize how far the other terminal is, etc.

Otherwise, enjoy the wedding :hi:

Hustle between flights.

She's marrying the preacher's son. Poor dude has NO idea what he's in for. My daughter likes Lobster, the Who, Joe Walsh and dancing..............

Thanks for the advice! We're lucky in that hubby will be riding a wheelchair provided by the airline. If we're late,they're screwed!

:hug:

Lobster, not so much. And I AM a preacher. I learned how to hold my liquor at seminary. So, the preacher's son might be a lot of fun!

Nah. They've been dating almost 4 years. My mother (her grandmother) doesn't like him. He must be perfect!

I know, I know she's 26, gorgeous, smart, etc etc etc....................

But damn!

At least it's a United Methodist church. A gay friend and his (now) spouse and partner were married by his mom last winter and she't a Methodist preacher.

I have nothing against preachers, but 20 hours on a plane? THAT I have a problem with!!

My kitties are going to be well cared for.
I have the dress and even nylons and heels.
Spouse bought a suit and tie.
We won't wear Carhartts to the rehearsal dinner.

AARGH!

and can get in real trouble with the church bigwigs by doing that. That took courage. I'm impressed.

20 hours?! Hell, that's what it took me to get to Zimbabwe! At least that wasn't at Thankgiving time. She'd better show you a great time...even if it is her wedding.

O'Hare is a zoo at holdiays. I used to go through it every Christmas, coming home from grad school in Boston. Others have said, and it bears repeating, move as quickly from one gate to another as you can. Once you get near your gate, you can browse the gift shops, read, whatever. But the distance between gates, even in the same concourse, can be daunting.

BUt mostly, take a deep breath. If you're meant to get there, you will. Getting upset won't get you there any sooner. (They should have huge banners across the concourses saying this!).

Enjoy your gorgeous, smart daughter's special day!

O'Hare is a zoo at the best of times.

The upside is you're going to get a really nice rental, because they'll have handed out all the four banger shitboxes already long before you get to Atlanta.

The spouse had a pretty major heart attack in August and I am NOT taking any chances! I'm carrying all the meds on board, along with notes from his doc, etc. Jeez, I am not looking forward to this! I love to fly, went to Eagle in the Caravan the other day - and any good landing is one you walk away from. But I don't like or trust airlines!

:hug: I've done the zoo thing - been to a LOT of rock concerts!! I ordered a wheelchair for each airport for my hubby, too.

Just hope the weather cooperates. Up here, the kids go to school at 40 below, and the roads are good if you don't mind ice fog! In this shot, you can't even see that Fairbanks is just down the hill!

nightmare. I had to transfer planes in O'Hare, and the one I had to board was at the furthest part of the airport from where I landed.

It's been awhile since I've been there, so things may have gotten better, but in case not, take a REALLY deep breath before you get off the plane there.

One thing you might want to do is check the airport's site before you go. If they have a map of the airport, print it out, and note where you're getting off one plane, and where you're boarding another one. That might help some.

Good luck!


And P.S. You daughter owes you BIG TIME!

YOU I missed!! And lotsa others. We are transferring from Alaska Airlines to Delta, and I've heard they are in the same terminal....

But who knows? Nobody!

Thank you, Ronnie Raygun, for deregulation of the airlines. You prick!

My daughter is really worth it. I'd probably get over it if it wasn't 20 hours AND a full day at work!

What I need to know is how reliable they are about meeting him at the plane with the wheelchair, if it will be a pain in the lower regions with me carrying his meds, and if we'll have time to make the plane to Atlanta. I've been pretty sick, too.

The worst part is, we are both smokers. I understand that ORD is the worst for getting through security (and back in) if I have to go outside for a puff. I haven't flown outside the state, or on a jet, for 15 years.

I'm scared to death!!!

I live in Chicago so that's my airport. It's a mess, especially this time of year. DO NOT go outside for a smoke, the airport is HUGE and connecting flights have a tendency to be it the gates that are furthest apart in the airport. And security is a nightmare. On our most recent flight in October, we were waiting in line to get through security and they funneled everyone into two LOOOOOONG lines. Suddenly and without warning or discernible reason, they decided to shut one of the lines down and told everyone to get in the remaining line. Let me reiterate that *they* had shuttled people in the two lines to begin with, so people were PISSED. Luckily my husband and I were in the line that remained open but I felt sorry for the folks who had to start all over.


Good luck.

Haven't been there in a while, but when you're Irish, you gotta go to Chicago - one of the truly great cities we have in this nation!

I have been told that our security clearance (I even have runway clearance through my job) will be the only one that we'll go through - and that's here in Fairbanks. So I just won't smoke. I went through the same type of fligt (years ago, and believe it or not, security was better) and didn't have a puff for about 26 hours.

Word on that, everyone, DON'T fly to South America!! Whew, THAT was a flight. Especially from here!

I only got to spend 3 days in Chicago, but if I were forced to live in a city, it'd be there.

Make sure you have at least a 2 1/2 hour layover there, so you can actually make your connecting flight.

when your itinerary gives you local time instead of the time on your watch. Alaska Standard is 4 hours earlier than East Coast, 3 hours Central, 2 hours Mountain, and 1 hour Pacific. It used to be we had 3 different time zones just in the State!!

We get into Chicago O'hare at 3 AM our time and leave for Atlanta at 8:42 Central (I think) time, whch (I think) gives us about 2 hours and 45 minutes.

Breate, nod, breathe in, breathe out..................

Terrified doesn't get it right.

Sorry I haen't been on for a while, but you realize this is where I go when I need real info!!

:hug::hi::thumbsup::hi::hug:

This is a No Worshiping zone, anyway.

If you haven't been in B'ham in 15 years you may find it's changed just a bit.
Got GPS?

The airport is huge. One of the busiest in the world. Raining right now and the snow is predicted to be coming in in early evening. There will be delays.

Wifi is hit and miss (mostly miss). What terminal are you coming into? Who are you flying on? Is the flight from Fairbanks an international flight? (I kid)

Anyway, the food is better than in years past. Bring a book or two because I think it is going to be nasty.

We are flying in on Alaska Airlines, flight 130, transferring to Delta 578. If we don't have to change terminals, I will be the happiest female on earth!

The only electronics will be our cell phones, a digital camera and a portable CD player.

Cats stomp on crackers (especially saltines) and fuzz them all over the house. Now I have to vacuum so our cat sitter won't be scandalized!

This coming from someone who flys on OLD DC-6 amd C-46's, Carvans and Cessna's on a pretty regular basis.......... I guess I'm an idiot, but I know all the pilots and FO's and FE's, so.............'

Hey! Maybe I'll get to meet the pilot and get a set of wings! Do they still do that?

It is supposed to start snowing in Chicago this afternoon. I hope you do not get delayed or layed over.

This time I have the bucks for cab and motel or rental car. But she gets married Friday.

I once made it home here to Fairbanks in 4 days, Wasn't fun. Chicago to Birmingham is and easier drive if necessary. Hell. I drive in snow about 7 months a yaar!

Seriously, how hard would it be to get a motel room? Even, say, 50 miles away?

But that was not during a Holiday, and only once were we there when they shut down the airport due to snow. And that was in 1989.

His dad used to work for Capone, then ratted on him and was killed. His airplane is b/w Terminal 1 and 2 in the walkway.

The airport was constructed in 1942-43 as a manufacturing plant for Douglas C-54s during World War II. The site was chosen for its proximity to the city and transportation. The two million square-foot (180,000 m²) factory needed easy access to the workforce of the nation's then-second-largest city, as well as its extensive railroad infrastructure. Orchard Place was a small pre-existing community in the area, and the airport was known during the war as Orchard Place Airport/Douglas Field (hence the call sign ORD). The facility was also the site of the Army Air Force's 803 Special Depot, which stored many rare or experimental planes, including captured enemy aircraft. These historic aircraft would later be transferred to the National Air Museum, going on to form the core of the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum's collection.
Douglas Aircraft Company's contract ended in 1945, and though plans were proposed to build commercial aircraft, the company ultimately chose to concentrate production on the west coast. With the departure of Douglas, the airport took the name Orchard Field Airport. In 1945, the facility was chosen by the City of Chicago as the site for a facility to meet future aviation demands. Though its familiar three-letter IATA code ORD still reflects the early identity of the airport, it was renamed in 1949 after Lt. Cmdr. Edward "Butch" O'Hare, a World War II flying ace who was awarded the Medal of Honor.

By the early 1950s, Chicago Midway International Airport, which had been the primary Chicago airport since 1931, had become too small and crowded despite multiple expansions and was unable to handle the planned first generation of jets. The City of Chicago and FAA began to develop O'Hare as the main airport for Chicago's future. The first commercial passenger flights were started there in 1955, and an international terminal was built in 1958, but the majority of domestic traffic did not move from Midway until completion of a 1962 expansion of O'Hare. The arrival of Midway's former traffic instantly made O'Hare the new World's Busiest Airport, serving 10 million passengers annually. Within two years that number would double, with more people passing through O'Hare in 12 months than Ellis Island had processed in its entire existence. In 1997, annual passenger volume reached 70 million; it is now approaching 80 million.

O'Hare Airport is municipally connected to the city of Chicago via a narrow strip of land, approximately 200 feet wide, running along Foster Ave from the Des Plaines river to the airport. This land was added to the city limits in the 1950s to assure the airport was contiguous with the city to keep it under city control. The strip is bounded on the north by Rosemont and the south by Schiller Park.<1> The CTA Blue Line was extended to the airport in 1984.



lots more at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O'Hare_International_Airport

What did he do at American? That wa one really decent airline!

It was a good arline - I suppose it still is. It was good to us. I still get the employee flight privileges but it is sometimes easier to buy a ticket than fly standby - especially with the crowded flights these days.

If so, your transfers at O'Hare may not be too bad.

I've only flown United through O'Hare, but all the United domestic flights are in one terminal, although that's a huge terminal with two long concourses connected by a long underground passageway.

In any case, check the terminal maps, go to your airline's website to find out what gates you're landing and taking off from, and plot your course of action.

Alaska Airlines to Delta in Chicago. Both are usually good, and I use flightstst.com because they do a fairly good job up here.

I just don't like a bus. Too manhy reminders of grade school!

Does anyone have info on hotels/motels etc. in Chicago? In case we can't fly? We do have enough for either, as well as a rental car, and we DO know how to drivein any kind of snow -been to Coldfoot and through Atigun Pass on the (gravel) Haul Road in a Jeep.

Thank you ALL so much =

still scared, tho!


Edited beause my fingers aren't cooperating today!

United had used up all its free hotel rooms and gave me a phone number where I could book a motel room for $49. It was somewhere in the wilds of the Chicago suburbs, I have no idea where. There didn't seem to be much else around it. However, the room was okay and it had a nice breakfast buffet in the morning.

I wouldn't have taken United up on the motel offer except that the flight I missed (due to a bad connection) had left at 9:30PM and I couldn't get another flight till 4:30PM the next day. If I had been able to get onto an early morning flight, I would have just stayed overnight in the airport.

http://www.sleepinginairports.net/

I'm at a loss as to how to help.

A guy helped with my carry-on, and I had 20 minutes to catch the next flight. Made it! Barely....

In Atlanta, we rent a car to drive to Birmingham; our return is fairly easy, as it is Atlanta-Seatt;e-Fairbanks. I KNOW the SEA-TAC airport, but not Atlanta.

Once we get our rental. I am assuming (yeah, right) we will take I-20 to Birmingham and once we get in that area, I am okay. Airport to where I am going is tougher. Any thoughts on that? IF I get the Atlanta?

Thanks! :friend:

And have to ride one on one of the moon rovers...

Or anything.

Grew up at KSC!

As soon as you get off your plane, HUSSLE to the next gate. O'Hare is huge and it takes forever to get from one gate to another.

They have wifi but you have to pay for it. (It's free in my hometown airport.)

Best thing about O'Hare? Flying out of it. :)