Jan 6, 2014 - Heading Home

We got back to the hotel at about 11:00 pm, and our bus was supposed to leave at 2:50 am., so there wasn't going to be much opportunity for sleep.  Dawn did sleep a bit, but I just lay on the bed for about half an hour and then got up and had a shower.

On the bus at 2:30, on the way to Copenhagen airport at 2:50, and arrive at the airport at about 3:30.  Then, we had to figure out what to do because the place, although open, had very few people there.  We printed off our boarding passes, but they didn't indicate what gate our plane was leaving from.  Then, we had to stand in line for an hour and a half until the check-in counter opened.  Initially, only 1 counter opened, and people were quite disgruntled.  The line up was very large.

Then they opened some more counters, and things started to move.  We still had lots of time before our plane boarded, so once we checked our bags, we had to go and find our gate for boarding.  The waiting room was overfull, with no seats available (well not a problem for those who got there early, but for the rest of us...).  We found a small restaurant area that was not open yet, and sat there until they started boarding our plane.

This flight was just over an hour to Frankfurt, and then it was walk and walk, go through security, walk some more, go through some more security, then walk and walk some more, and go through some more security.  After that, it was wait for boarding (about an hour), and then load the plane.  Once again, we had pretty good seats.  The only problem is that they were right over the wing, so it was pretty difficult to see much when we were in the air.

I can say that we would definitely fly again with Lufthansa, if we had the opportunity.  They certainly fed and watered us well.  A couple meals on the flight, a couple snacks, a number of opportunities for drinks during meals, snacks, as well as other times.  For those who drink, there was quite a selection of wines, liquors, and beer.  All of this included in the price of the flight.  We had never been on flights where people didn't have to pay for this sort of thing.

Well, we arrived in Vancouver just after noon, Pacific time.  Vancouver airport was a slow, frustrating experience.  Another plane arrived right behind ours, and the line up to declare our items was huge.  It moved fairly quickly, but it was back and forth walking through the queue until we made it to the machine to make our declaration.  Then, more queuing up to go through customs.  Then waiting for our bags (this took quite a while), and once they came, going through another customs check point, although this one was quick).  Then find where our shuttle was to pick us up, and wait until it came.

We got to the hotel about 2:00 pm, and checked in.  After settling in, we had to go find the travel company for the trip to China, in February.  We had to make our application for the Chinese Visa, and it took us a bit of time to find the travel company.  By this time, we were really dragging our rear ends.  The office was up a flight of stairs, which by this time, was quite a chore.

After that, it was back to the hotel.  We weren't hungry, so we sat around, watched TV, got caught up on emails, and generally unwound (as much as we could in a small room with only 1 uncomfortable chair).  It was difficult to keep our eyes open, so we thought we would stay in and watch the news.  Well, we got the beginning (Dawn remembers seeing Chris Galus), but that was it.  We were asleep.  By my calculation, we had basically been awake for about 45 hours (from get up on Jan 5 in Sweden to sleep Jan 6 in Vancouver)

We had a great trip.  We very much enjoyed the tournament, we met some people who we really liked, and we were thoroughly impressed with Destiny Tours, the travel group who organized everything. We are now considering putting our name on the list for their tour to Finland for the 2016 World Junior Tournament.