Only the Ishams

Have this bad of luck! Haha I swear me and airports just do not get along.

Well we finally made it home last night after a nightmare of an ordeal on Sunday. We were scheduled to fly out Sunday at 800am but did not make the flight. Here is what happened...

Woke up at 4am in order to get to the metro to get the first train to the airport since we were on the opposite side of the city. I am always paranoid that I am going to miss my flight so I wanted to make sure we had plenty of time. We got there with about 10 minutes to spare before boarding so it was a good thing we got up that early. Anyways the train let us off at one terminal and we headed through walking down the airport. JR had lugged our two big bags all that way plus 2 smaller bags.. and therefore was ready to put them down. So..... when we got there he got a cart that we could put all of them on to push around and make it easier. Well we had also gotten out the folder that we had kept all our important information in (passports, flight times, etc) to see what flight number we were and this turned out to be the biggest mistake. We ended up leaving that folder on the cart when we got on the airport shuttle to get to our check in point. He realized it as soon as we got there and went back to get it no longer than 10 minutes later but someone had taken it. I know it was a mistake that I could have made so I am not blaming him by any means... it was just a very misfortunate thing that happened to two people who were so ready to be back in America!!! Well no passports meant that we couldnt board the flight of course so instead we spent the next 5 hours searching all over the airport and talking to everyone we could think of there to figure out what to do. We got the bad news that we would have to wait and go to the US Embassy to get new passports issued before they would allow us on a plane. And just as our luck was going.. .it was Sunday and they were closed on Sundays, as well as Monday for Columbus day. That meant that we couldnt get new ones made until Tuesday and they wouldnt be ready for us to get until Wednesday...... meaning we wouldnt be home until THURSDAY!!! Holy cow... just imagine how furious we are at this point.. but again what can you do??? We were so lucky to be sent an angel at the Lufthansa airline that worked with us to do everything she could. She called the police all over the airport to report them missing, called the Embassy, let us use her phone and internet, booked us a hotel to stay at for a very cheap rate AND dropped our rebooking fees that would have been $500!!!!! Oh praise the Lord for Isabelle :)

Fast forward to noon on Sunday and we received the best news we had heard all day... our passports had been turned in! JR ran to go and get them to make sure everything was there and sure enough someone had just taken them off the cart.. we guess thinking there was money inside... and then dropped it off at the service desk once they saw there was nothing they wanted in it. This meant no waiting on new passports and we could fly back on Monday!!!!

We arrived in Raleigh at 7:00pm last night and I can say that it was the happiest moment of our whole trip!!! Dont get me wrong, we did have a wonderful time while in Paris before all of this happened... but of course right now are a little tainted with all of the terrible travel horrors on the way home.

I will post all of our great pictures and experiences soon I promise! Right now I am playing major catch up to get back into things at work and my lunch break is officially over :(