The Dearly Departed

It's nothing short of a Christmas 'miracle' that Wendy and Julian were able to fly to Toronto yesterday. All day long flights originating from the Fredericton airport were cancelled. When I took them to the airport, we looked at the arrivals and departures board. The flights to Halifax, Ottawa and Montreal were all cancelled, yet their 8:20 p.m. flight to Toronto was still scheduled to go.

I left Wendy and Julian at the airport and drove back into Fredericton. At 8:25 p.m. the phone rang and my first thought was 'oh shit, they cancelled the flight after all'. It was Wendy on the phone, which left me even more convinced that the flight was toasted. Amazingly not. Wendy called to say that they boarded about half the people on the plane, including Wendy and Julian, and then announced that they'd be sitting on the plane (on the tarmac) for another hour and a half because the Toronto airport was backlogged with re-directed flights.

I received an e-mail from Wendy at 3:25 a.m. (AST) saying that they made it to the condo at 3 a.m. Sounded like one hell of a long day, but it was better than the alternative....

People whose flights were cancelled earlier in the day were being booked on flights for Tuesday because all Monday flights were already full. Ah, winter travel in Canada.....ain't it grand!