uma difícil jornada

(I really tried to keep these updates short, but after the third page of single-spaced text, I think it may be best to split this post up.)

We awoke to rain in Atlanta. And it would rain for the rest of the day. We got breakfast and hung around our room until the last possible moment. Desmond must have really had to pee (or he was super excited to get back in the car) because when we got to the parking lot he made a very large river on the asphalt. I think I saw Penny roll her eyes, but that could’ve been the sedation still wearing off.

Our initial plan had been to find a dog park to let the dogs romp around after being stuck in a car for fifteen hours. We also hoped it would prepare them relax in their crates in the underbelly of an airplane for 8+ hours. We still had a lot of time left, though, and Brett really wanted to take me to a restaurant that he went to once while working in the city- Pappadeaux. All he had to say was “seafood” and I was hooked (see what I did there? Tom?).

Even though it’s a chain based out of Texas, the restaurant itself looks pretty cool inside and out. It’s decorated like an early 1900’s Louisiana plantation/diner. Very ‘old southern’. This isn’t a review of their establishment or anything but I have to note that their servers (all of them) were nicer than any server we’ve ever had in Kansas City. An hour or so later, we went back to the car and the dogs (they were great).

I sent a text to a friend who lives in Atlanta (with a dog) and also started doing a quick Google search for dog parks. We ended up going to Piedmont Park by recommendation. First of all, I love that area. There were several houses for sale that were right across the street from the park. It was a super cute Midtown-like neighborhood (for you Kansas Citians) with a lot of independent restaurants and bars within walking distance.

Because of the rain, the park was empty. The dogs still had a blast though, Brett and I just stood at opposite ends of the mulched area and took turns calling them over. They got pretty tired (and soaked), so after about an hour we hit the road again. At this point we were just kind of aimlessly driving around. If it hadn’t been raining it would have been easy to spend several hours at Piedmont Park. I think we ended up making a quick stop at Sonic for some ice cream and then we found a gas station to start prepping the crates for transit.

so happy

Prepping the crates took a little bit longer than we anticipated- it’s not easy to assemble two extra large crates out of the back of a van in a gas station parking lot. After Brett assembled them I marked them with sharpie (LIVE ANIMAL, DESTINATION BSB, etc). We put the pee pads in the bottom (I knew one would pee his crate for sure) and put old airline blankets on top of those. We also stuck a small stuffed animal in each. We had slept with the animals in our bed by our pillows for about two weeks, so I was hoping that having something that smelled like mom and dad would help them relax a little.

After that, it was time for the moment of truth. Time to head to the airport and check in. Let me just say that finding the International terminal at the Atlanta airport is just dumb- it has to be like five miles away from all of the other terminals. As if we weren’t stressed enough, the dang terminal took forever to get to!

We had to wait to check in at a certain counter, and even then, the woman that was checking us in didn’t have any experience with pets checked as baggage. Everything took a lot longer than it should have. The real kicker is this- when she noticed that we had one-way tickets to Brasilia, the woman noticed on her computer that it said something like “passengers with one way tickets could be denied entry”. She almost didn’t check us in because of this, but her superior said to “go ahead and send them, if they get denied they get denied.” Excuse me, what?

At this point, Brett has left to take the rental car back, the dogs are on their way to baggage to await being loaded onto the plane and this woman just told me that we could get refused entry to Brazil upon arrival? My first thought is that we don’t have the paperwork to get the dogs back into the US, just into Brazil. They’d have to stay there! Returning the rental car took a very long time, and Brett got back about 10 minutes after they had started boarding our flight. Of course, the security lines that were empty were now very long.

Luckily they opened another security line and we made it through quicker than we had expected. However, we found out that we were in terminal F, and our flight was leaving out of terminal E- a train ride away. Also, our gate was E1, meaning it was either the first one or the gate at the very end. I knew it would be the gate at the very end.  We got through security, got on a train right away, got off at the next stop, and took off running.

We slowed down when we saw that there was still a crowd of people at our gate, but I was still freaking out about what the woman had told us about entry to Brazil. Would they really refuse us entry like that? We had the correct paperwork. Our only option would be to quickly book a return flight using the in-flight wifi, but I had asked the Delta woman about that and she said it would not work (who knows why).

As soon as we settled into our first class seats I got a little emotional- I think it was the prospect of being refused entry to the country and possibly having to leave the dogs there that got me. I also didn’t get to see them being loaded onto the plane, although that might have been for the better. We did have a baggage man come on and give us the ticket that said that they had been loaded, and the captain said that they were good. It still didn’t help me relax because I knew that the dogs were probably really scared!

We received pillows and nice, heavy blankets along with headphones, eye masks, lotion, and compression socks when we got to our seats. Also, complimentary bottled water and wine, juice, champagne, or a mimosa. We had four choices of entrées for dinner- chicken with mushrooms, beef filet with sweet potatoes, spaghetti, or a chilled salmon and cheese plate. I chose the chicken and Brett, of course, got the filet. We took off without a hitch and immediately hit turbulence. A lot of turbulence. Brett and I were really upset that the babies had to experience that in the baggage hold. Also, we didn’t get dinner service until maybe 11 pm (we took off at 9:30). We each watched a movie while we waited for the turbulence to subside. Oh- it’s important to note that we couldn’t access the wifi until we made it out of the turbulence, and by that time we were over 100 miles from the US. So we weren’t able to book a return flight at all.

Dinner was a three-course meal. The first course consisted of peeled shrimp over avocado slices with a side of couscous, a garden salad, some sort of tomato soup, and a roll. It was a lot of food! The next course was the entrée. My chicken came with mushrooms, vidalia onions, and some weird, overcooked noodles. Brett’s filet came with what looked like broccoli and sweet potatoes. I was too full by that point to try any of his. For dessert I had chocolate cheesecake and Brett got vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce. We pretty much fell asleep right after dinner. Brett didn’t sleep very well (no surprise there) and I only slept “okay”. Definitely better than on our flight to China though.

We each had the “hot breakfast” option about an hour before arrival, but we weren’t hungry. I felt sort of bad sending it back, but my nerves were getting the better of me. I tried to look out the window to see as much of Brazil as I could since this could possibly be my only chance. After we landed and taxied for a short while, Brett and I were the first off of the plane. We got into the ‘foreigners’ queue and anxiously waited for our turn. I was freaking out at this point- what would we do if we were denied entry to the country?

To be continued!