Saturday, March 5, 2016

From Shendoah, to ShenDOHA, and beyond: traveling with a double agent

The Bhutan Group is currently 27+ hours in to our travel and we are still not at our final destination. Don't let that fool you though, we've already had a couple of adventures along the way. 
Hour 1 in to travel: we had just arrived to Dulles airport and were getting ready to check in for our boarding passes when one of group members, Ryan, realized his wallet had found its way out of his bag and was heading home with the shuttle. Ryan seemed unfazed and was whistling a tune to himself while he triple checked his bags and retraced his steps. We called the shuttle driver, got the wallet back, and were back on track. 
Hour 2 in to travel: the group is set on Five Guys burgers. We're all talking about how we can't wait to eat it. We walk all the way to the opposite end of the terminal to get it. Guess what? Five Guys is closed. That did not deter some members and they made their way all the way to a different terminal to get the burgers they craved. They made it back just in time to board, fueled up to watch some movies and catch some Z's on the plane
Hour 3-23 in to travel: relatively painless. After a thirteen hour flight from Washington D.C. to Doha, Qatar and a four hour flight to Kolkata, India we arrive in the airport eager to make it to our hotel for some showers after a particularly "aromatic" flight. 
Hour 24 in to travel: we wait in line to have our visas approved. There were only 16 people in line, including all 13 of us, and it still took an entire hour to do so . 
Hour 25 in to travel: "Ryan" gets stopped by the person checking him in. He's being questioned about his passport. Soon, 11 more agents come over to question him. "Ryan" tells them that it is indeed who he says he is and no, he's never owned another passport. Eventually, they let him through and we could continue on our journey. Despite the confusion and stress, "Ryan" kept a smile on his face the entire time. 


We've got our eyes on you, Ryan- if that even is your real name. 
Hour 26 in to travel: riding in shuttle to our hotel we passed over 40 stray dogs that are 100% fearless. They would lay in the middle of the road and would not move, even with a shuttle barreling towards them. One stray dog was a little different looking, it had horns, spots, and I'm pretty sure it mooed (there was literally a cow in the middle of the road at 3 in the morning)
Hour 27 in to travel: Everyone is tucked away in their beds where they can sleep without the aid of a travel neck pillow. In an hour we will be back in the airport getting ready to finally fly to Bhutan! 
More unexpected adventures definitely await the Bhutan GCP group and I know we'll take each one of them in stride! 

2 comments:

Csalvador said...

I couldn't read this one. . the yellow writing on the white background. 😞

Anonymous said...

Text is hard to read!