The journey begins...

In the last few days, weeks, and even months of our time in Columbus, Talia and I have been overwhelmed by the love and support that has been shown to us. So many friends have offered assistance, cars, housing, food, sometimes even their children. We're truly grateful to have such excellent people in our lives, and you've made the process of leaving much easier in a logistical sense, but much harder on an emotional level. Feels, I have so many feels!

Seeing as Columbus has given us so much, we wanted our last steps on US soil to be in the 614. We therefore took pretty much the only international flight you can take from Port Columbus International Airport - the commuter flight to Toronto.* So long, America, thanks for all the freedom!

Talia heading toward a Bombardier Dash 8-100 for the first leg of our journey.

Our second flight was with Icelandair to Reykjavik (the capital of Iceland). We went to the area designated as the check-in desk for Icelandair, only to find Cubana de Aviacíon instead! While Cuba is a warmer destination than Iceland, it's not in the right direction... It turns out that several of the smaller airlines share check-in desks at Toronto, and we just needed to wait a while for Icelandair.

The Icelandair flight was pleasant. Upon boarding the plane (a 757), we were given a little bottle of Icelandic glacier water! We also got an exit row, so yay, extra legroom! Since it was an overnight flight, the lights were dimmed, and the ambient lighting on the cabin ceiling above the overhead compartments looked like the aurora borealis. We were rocked to sleep by gentle Icelandic lullabies sung over the loudspeaker by the co-pilot.**

Upon arrival in Reykjavik at 6am local time (2am Ohio time), we had just enough time to breathe the cool Nordic sea air and look at some Icelandic sweaters before boarding our flight to Glasgow. We were again seated in an exit row! The Norse gods were smiling upon us. The 2-hour flight to Glasgow was uneventful (another 757).

We had fun in the immigration area of Glasgow - we were asked if we lived in the USA or in the UK - "neither, well, we don't really live anywhere". The joys of temporary vagrancy!

We had less fun in the baggage claim area. The carousel went around and around and around... But no bags. All of our earthly possessions - including Talia's cello(!) - were nowhere to be seen.

This was not the auspicious beginning to our journey that we had hoped for. Not at all. We filed a lost luggage report, we were told they would call us once they had any updates, and we went on our way with my parents to their house in the south of Scotland.

30 hours later, we get a call saying the bags are in Glasgow and on their way to my parents' house. We will be reunited tomorrow, just in time for Susan's wedding! Hooray!

* Well, we actually took it because it was the cheapest... But the symbolism is nice, right?

** At this point I had taken a few sleeping pills so I am not entirely sure that this actually happened.