This airspace is restricted...

Ok, so I’ve been sufficiently scolded for not keeping up on my blog. I don’t really have any good excuses, especially since I’ve only worked 5 days this month. Living halfway around the world, I see so many things each day that are worth writing home about… I guess I don’t even know where to begin. So, I’ll start with my flight to Dubai and work my way back from there….

We are currently sitting in Kuwait. We had no plans to stop in Kuwait, but here we are, refueling. Funny, that’s the second time that’s happened to me – ever – and both times within the last week. It’s been a crazy 10 days. Here’s a quick recap of my travels back to the states:

Dec 18, 12:30am: Board plane to DC. 6:30am: After 15 hours, arrive at Dulles, only to begin a 12 hour layover. Take a 5o cent bus ride to the mall to buy a SIM card for my phone and a sweater (it’s a tad colder in DC). 6:30 pm: Board plane to Portland. 10:30 pm: arrive in Portland to see the winter wonderland that would soon become my nemesis.

Dec 20, 9:00am: Begin the coldest run ever in Forest Park. Turn around after 45 minutes. 12:00pm: Learn that my 10pm flight to Ohio is cancelled due to the snow. Rebook for Monday.

Dec 21, 3:00pm: Run 60 long minutes on the treadmill, being stared at by a massive elk.


Dec 22, 3:00am: Wake up to check flight status. Cancelled. Proceed to spend the next 2 hours on the phone with Expedia trying to rebook. No luck. End up booking with Travelocity for 3x the original cost. 6:00am: arrive at the airport for a 9:45 departure. 10am: Port of Portland closes runway to all air traffic for snow removal. 11:00am: Board plane. 2:00pm: Plane finally lifts off ground, but only with enough fuel to get to Reno, NV. Stop in Reno, refuel, continue on to Dallas. 8:30pm: arrive in Dallas, TX, miss connection to Columbus by 20 minutes. Spend night at hotel in Dallas.

Dec 23, 10:00am: Board plane bound to Columbus. 2:00pm: arrive in Columbus, finally! 6:00pm: Gafford Family Christmas – great to see and be with my family. White Elephant exchange is priceless as always.

Dec 25: Merry Christmas! 5:00pm: Wright Family Christmas. Yummy cookies and good times. Lots of funny little dogs.

Dec 26: I pretend to be a Commonwealth citizen as I celebrate Boxing Day by shopping!!!!

Dec 27, 11:00am: Return to Portland, via Chicago O’Hare. 1:30pm: With no delays, make it to Portland on time! Woo hoo!

Dec 29, 7:30am: Board plane to Washington DC. 3pm: Flight arrives early – they kindly remind us to keep that in mind for future flights that might be delayed. Foreshadowing??? 10:00pm: Depart to Dubai. 12 hour flight. Almost home.

Dec 30: 9 hours into the flight I awake to witness our plane make a sharp u-turn over Syria (see #1 on the map - Garren took the picture during our flight)

Plane continues out into the Mediterranean where it circles in a holding pattern off the coast of Lebanon for over an hour (see #2). Finally we receive information from the pilot: the Lebanese and Syrians won’t allow us in their airspace. They claim our plane’s certificate had expired although the pilot claims it was still valid for another 48 hours. So, which way to go? Divert south passing by Israel and then through Egypt and Saudi Arabia or north, around Syria and then through Iraq? Hmmm…tough decision, kindof like asking - would you rather get a hot poker in the eyeball or would you prefer to soak in bathwater full of blood-sucking leeches? Regardless, the Iraqi’s granted us access to their airspace so we circumvented Syria (see #3) and crossed the length of Iraq, flying over Baghdad. Of course, the holding pattern in the Mediterranean took up most of our fuel reserves, so we made an unscheduled stop in Kuwait to refuel. Which brings us back to Kuwait, and the beginning of this post. We are now scheduled to land in Dubai just after midnight, 4+ hours after our scheduled arrival time.

Summary: 13 days, 8 planes, 2 unexpected stopovers en route, 60 hours on a plane, 35 hours at the airport, 1 night at a hotel.

The verdict: While it was worth it to see friends and family, it definitely wasn’t the trip I originally signed up for.

P.S. If you can help it, don’t fly United internationally.

My New Year's Resolution: to not suck at blogging

So, it appears as though I haven't written in about two months. Well, I don't really remember what happened two months ago, but it must not have been worth writing home about. Garren, Rebecca, Matt and I took the Prado off roading. That was fun. We only had to get out and push once thanks to the mad driving skills of Garren. If I was driving we would've gotten stuck at least 10 times. Maybe even permanently.

December has come and gone so quickly. Probably because I only worked 5 days this month. Yep, you read it right. 5 days. Pretty sweet, eh? The first two weeks of the month were off for National Day and a Muslim holiday. National Day festivities were pretty funny. More so the days leading up to National Day and the people getting their cars ready to parade around town. Garren and I watched the fireworks in Abu Dhabi. Pretty cool, but no Red, White and Boom. I was actually surprised at how many red, white and blue fireworks there were. The UAE colors are red, green and black. I don't suppose they make black fireworks. Maybe the blue was meant to replace the black, or maybe they just don't come in many other colors...

The following week, Garren, Kara, Rebecca, Asha, Tracey, Dave and I loaded up Asha's and my matching white Prado's and took off to the northern tip of the peninsula - Musandam, Oman. Our intent was to find a nice secluded beach to camp on for a few nights. Beach we found. Secluded it was not.

Anyways, we ended up camping at this remote beach, only accessible by 4WD, called Khor Najd. The view from the top was amazing, and camping was fun too, but it was a bit spoiled by some locals. They weren't Omani, perhaps Emirati, we don't know. But completely ignorant and ridiculous. It was a full moon out, plenty of light. It was getting late and most of the camp had their tents set up and were settled in for the night. Around 9pm, this group of 10 or so pulled up steps away from our site and started to set up camp. And camping to them meant getting out the generator and using it to power four massive lights. Think of the long fluorescent bulbs that are used in businesses and schools. Attach one of those bulbs vertically to a long stick and turn it on. Four of them. We swear you could see their campsite from outerspace. Ridiculous. We even asked them to turn them off at one point, at least hoping they would turn off one or two. Nope. They insisted that is their way of camping and we needed to be tolerant of how they liked to camp. I ask myself, where is the tolerance in return??? Doesn't exist. Ignorant.


Our days were fun, we drove up to what seemed like the top of the world. My car couldn't go any further up, and we were lucky we made it back down (again, Garren's doing).


Kara, Garren and I took a Dhow cruise to explore the fjords of the Musandam peninsula. The highlight of the trip for sure. We ended up snorkelling and just hanging out on the dhow all day, soaking up the sun and the scenery, and occaisonally getting a dolphin to come and play in the wake of the dhow.

We returned from Musandam only to work for 4 days, then Garren and I were off to the US. Another adventure for a different post.