La Paz Vacation: Day 1

Our vacation to sunny La Paz began two weeks ago with the sound of an 80's rock tune blaring from our alarm clock at 2:00 a.m. Molly, Trina, and I were catching the 6:00 a.m. flight out of SeaTac, and Jess and Cooper were catching a 6:30 a.m. flight to Idaho Falls. All the bags were packed the night before, so all we had to do was wake, shower (I certainly needed the help waking up), down a cup of coffee, prep the kids, and load the mountain of luggage into the shuttle van. The shuttle van arrived at 2:50 and whisked us off to the airport.

At the airport, as I picked up one of Jess's bags from out of the van, out fell my camera bag onto the pavement. It landed upside down – where there is no padding. As I looked at it in disbelief, the driver said "At least it was just a computer." – indicating that it was obviously a bad thing to fall. I replied: "No. Worse, it is a camera." While I was loading car seats in the van he was loading bags and placed the camera bag under a 40 lb duffle bag!!! We pretty well had the airport to ourselves at 3:30 a.m., so getting through ticketing and security was a breeze. As soon as we settled in at the airport I checked the camera – the electronics were all screwed up. It would shoot, but all the displays were not working. I was speechless. I'd only had the thing working for about 6 weeks since all the repairs.

Meanwhile, Jess and Trina chatted about kids traveling and all to come in the future that matters (kids). I fetched a breakfast burrito from Qdoba, shot a few pics by adjusting shutter speed after I shot a photo.

Trina carried Molly on her pack when we were in the airports. This not only freed up her hands, but seems to keep Molly quite calm, and comfortable. Without the pack, she'd certainly have been trying to get to the floor and crawl around. She's not much of a cuddler unless it means we are feeding her.

2:00 a.m. is real early to wake anyone, let alone an 11-month old. Despite the short night, Molly was her usual cheerful self and was showing no sign of the previous day's vomiting (much to our relief- starting out a vacation in a non-English speaking country w/ an infant that has the flu is rather unnerving). Before long she was fast asleep.

A two-hour flight landed us at LAX. Molly had no problems with the flight at all, slept through some of it and all was smooth an uneventful. That was about to change. Upon arrival we checked the departures board for the gate for the next flight. It wasn't posted yet, so we laid low and took turns letting Molly walk around the terminal while holding our hands for balance. Eventually our gate was posted: #206 – a Delta partnered flight. Since all the gates around us were numbered in the 30s we asked a lady at one of the gates how to get to #206. She said to catch the shuttle at gate 39 to the Delta terminal, and so we did. After a convoluted tour by shuttle bus, the shuttle bus driver told us that that there was no gate 206 anywhere at LAX. Back we went to the Alaska terminal. We then found out that catching a shuttle was correct, but not that one. When boarding time arrived we all loaded on a bus and took a ride that felt long enough to deliver us in Burbank. We eventually arrived at an empty building in the middle of nowhere with a "206" painted on the side and our plane waiting next to it. And off we went with a plane full of blue-hairs that had booked a whale watching trip with National Geographic.

Molly took another nap on the flight and handled it perfectly. She received many compliments in the La Paz airport on how good she was.

The reward for the early morning was soon at hand: blue skies, warm temperatures, the first of many cold Pacificos, and a happy grandpa.

Each night we were treated to a beautiful sunset over La Paz before dinner.