We're Not in Indiana Anymore

Tuesday afternoon Fred and Louise came from Terre Haute and Fred spent the evening helping Steven work on his car (thanks, Fred!), while Louise and I did some last minute shopping for running shorts, tank tops, and sandals for the trip. I was ready to start packing at about 11:00 PM and stayed up until 2:30 AM getting everything ready. Two hours of sleep went by quickly when my alarm went off at 4:30 AM. Steven, typical male, was able to get up and pack the morning of our trip. Prior to packing, I was thinking that Steven and I could share one large suitcase. I should have known better. By the time I was done packing I had filled the entire thing on my own, and surpassed the 50 pound weight limit by 4.5 pounds. We had to do some repacking when we made it to the check-in counter at the airport. We made it to our gate just in time to board with our section. Thanks to Louise who was willing to get up and drive us to the airport at 5:30 in the morning!

We flew to Orlando and had a layover for just a few hours. I explored the airport and rode the tram back and forth between terminals a few times in search of food. Chick-fil-a nuggets in hand and it was time to board our next flight. As we neared our destination, the view from the plane window was beautiful. You can see lots of little islands and the cool blue/green shade of the ocean.The flight from Orlando, FL to Nassau, Bahamas was a quick 55 minutes. We sat on the plane for another 30 minutes once we landed, waiting for a gate to become available. They don't assign gates to incoming planes, I guess it works on a first come first serve basis. The wait didn't bother me since I just took another nap!
Once we arrived to the Bahamas Airport, we learned that nobody is in a hurry to do anything here! We waited in a room full of hundreds of other people to get through the lines at Immigration. During the wait Steven and I decided we would do well to move here and teach them a few things to improve their efficiency. They checked our passports, took our immigration cards (for visitors) that we filled out on the plane, then allowed us through to collect our checked luggage. After we found our luggage (thankfully still there since it had been just sitting for probably 2 hours), they checked our passports once again (not sure why) and we were allowed to exit the airport. We took a cab ride from the airport to our hotel. The cabs are all old beat up vans and the drivers, as in other cities, like to honk often. It was quite an experience to drive down the leftside of the road and go left at a round-a-bout instead of right! Some cars even have the driverseat on the rightside. It's strange to have to stop and think about which way to look for traffic when crossing the street. We arrived at our hotel and were pleased to see that it looked really nice. As we waited in line to get checked into our hotel room, we we reminded again that unlike the US, nobody was in much of a hurry at their jobs! I guess we could learn a thing or two about slowing down and being patient!