joburg to munchen to south carolina to ORD

After a sad farewell to the Polei, Jen and I wandered around the airport coughing and continued to support the SAfrican economy. We found the JNB terminal had more shops and vendors to explore than the terminal we were in at Heathrow - very surprising. Because I might be neurotic about timely arrivals for flights, we had about 2.5 hours after checking in, and spent every minute exploring, including a free shot (and shot glass) of Amarula! Eventually we boarded our plane with a the rest of the vuvuzela carrying folks and headed for Germany.

The SAA flight was again fantastic (sorry Sarah). All the wine and other beverages we could handle. The only downside was the dinner options were limited to chicken and lamb, and Jen doesn't eat lamb, and by the time they reached us they were out of chicken. The rest of the meal was tasty, if unremarkable.

We only had about 3.5 hours in Munchen - definitely not enough time to head into the city - so we just wandered around the airport eating and drinking and supporting the German economy. One of our first stops was a coffee stand so we could get some juice when I saw a basket of freshly baked pretzels. I wasn't really hungry enough for any encased meats, but the other 2 things we talked about eating in Germany were pretzels and beer. So I ordered a pretzel with my juice - absolutely buttery and fantastic. Best pretzel ever. We continued wandering and made a last stop for a beer and a basket of pretzels. 9am beers are great for headcolds. Really. The beer was good if unremarkable, and the pretzels were tasty but not as buttery as the previous one.

Our flight back to the US was possibly even better than the SAA flights. It was definitely the biggest plane we've ever been on, had the restrooms downstairs (which was great because it eliminated the aisle congestion) and the pleasant German staff could not pour us enough wine or juice. Literally every 15 min someone was offering us something. And possibly the greatest thing ever - metal sporks! Fantastic. We didn't get a lot of sleep, but we did watch plenty of mediocre to bad movies.

Arriving in Charlotte was sad. We were excited for the wedding and the chance to soon see old friends and family, but Charlotte is way less exciting than anywhere we'd been in 3 weeks. Because I'm dumb, instead of just driving from Charlotte I had us fly another 20 min to Asheville. Seems innocent enough, but this cost us about 4 hours of our lives we'll never get back. Somehow our bags didn't make it onto our plane, so we had to hang around the Asheville area for an hour hoping they would come in on the next flight. Luckily they did. Then yesterday when we were leaving, apparently there were storms in Chicago that had delayed the earlier flights between AVL and ORD, so we were delayed. Instead of getting home at 7, we got home at 7:45. And AVL might be the smallest airport ever. There is literally 1 employee for each airline, and that employee is responsible for all tasks - checking in, boarding planes, retrieving luggage, etc. Hilarious, but not efficient. And when we finally got on the plane, the captain came on and was like well, I have some bad news - this flight usually takes about an hour 15 hour 20, but because of the line of storms it's probably going to take about 2 because we have to fly to St. Louis to avoid them. Sweet.

Even though we were somewhat sick and severely jetlagged, we had a great time hanging out with Scott and Jess and the rest of the wedding folks. It was also great seeing Jen's grandma and aunts and uncles. We didn't *need* that ham, greenbean casserole, biscuits and oreo pie, but it was totally awesome.

Arriving back in Chicago was bittersweet. It was great to be home, and we were excited to see our furry little friend, but the adventure of a lifetime was officially over. And the sobering realities of "work" and "bills". Dislike. Pictures will be uploaded soon, and a post-mortem will be prepared. Like everyone else, Jen and I are now living vicariously through the Polei....

MO