Travel Talk

Thunderstorms at 37,000 Feet, Old Friends & Delayed Flights


Good day,

I stand here body-rocking to my own beat while the floors vibrate underneath my OG Air Jordan V Fire-Red adorned feet. Ever seen a wild thunderstorm?! Ever seen a wild thunderstorm from 37,000 feet while the sunsets!?  Yesterday was a large scoop of vanilla ice cream when your palate demands all the flavors of the rainbow AND MORE. For those of you curious, I took a few flights, rotted in an airport, met some cool people and others who most certainly weren’t.

So it all starts in Keystone, Colorado the night before. There was an egregious party (hat tip to those who threw it) that got disturbed before it ran it’s course, sad. Anyways for some reason I was online at 2am and this gent I met in Nicaragua was like “yo man, are you in Keystone!?” I said yes but I leave tomorrow morning to which this distinguished gent replied “Great, I’ll meet you for breakfast at 9am”, indeed. If you travel the world and “put yourself out there” aka take the chances to jump in on a conversation you like or just throw your ego aside and make the effort to meet people… Before you know it, you’ll literally have a crew of friends EVERYWHERE YOU GO.

Suffice to say we eat breakfast, caught up, laughed and I was on my way to a long long trip home.  Jumped in the shuttle and 2 hours later and 6000 feet of elevation change we roll into DIA aka the Denver International Airport aka the world’s most frustrating free internet connection aka third largest airport in the USA!? Wait around, make some pleasant small talk and that which is not, ha. Some people roll out and you feel like a near dead dog who wants to close his eyes forever but you can’t, you have a flight to Toronto!

The time finally comes and you board, prepare for take off! Hey, why are we driving to a garage? Oh yeah, naturally the plane has an error and after some time on the tarmac it’s time to fly, literally. You fly into Toronto and half way there you enter a crazy lightening and thunderstorm and the little sardine tin you call home is getting thrown around like random change left in a person’s pocket inside the washing machine. Finally you flee from the fight in the sky and it’s near midnight. Naturally as an extreme extrovert you become friends with this gent who had an even longer day and spend the next 40 minutes talking each others ears off about random travel stories, true story.

It’s time to board but guess what!?!? The plane has a problem so they make us switch planes. When it’s just gents like me who have a normal walking speed of your average jogger things move fast. When you have elderly people who are traveling at 1am and luggage to move, things take time. Suffice to say the plan was delayed 45 minutes and yours truly finally landed in Ottawa at 2am. You can get SO SO SO stressed in airports if you’re weak. Just turn your mind off and sit there knowing everything is fine in the universe and this is part of your journey to your goal. If your mind is racing a 3 hour flight seems like 3 years, when it’s blank and time doesn’t exist it just passes as no moment is really different from the next.

One thing I LOVE about Canada is going to the customs. It’s like the long row of customs officials are the United Nations. In Toronto it appeared as though every nation of the world was represented and they all welcomed you home. I’m proud to be from a country that supports peoples heritage, Canada is a unique place. If you can’t afford to travel the world, just go to Toronto and you’ll meet people from every country in the world, seriously. Oh yeah, go in the summer though as the winters in Canada are simply not hospitable.

I always have been and always will be proud to be Canadian even though I’ve chose the Caribbean for my crib.

It’s great to be home, even better to be leaving again in 5 days!

Tips hat,

P.S: Great kicking it again Scott, see you next time on LCI!

P.P.S:  James, great catching up with you on that early morning random rendezvous…

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