Eight hours until departure—that is, six hours until we leave for the airport! Sherrylee and I are pretty well packed for our twenty-seven-day trip—just our toiletries to add after showers this morning!
We have two carry-on suitcases, one school-size backpack, and one purse to carry on the planes. In addition, we have packed one “winter” suitcase because we are going to be in relatively warm countries for the first two weeks, but the last thirteen days will be in northern Europe where it will definitely be winter. That winter suitcase has Sherrylee’s boots and our winter coats.
The winter suitcase is possible because we have a seven-hour layover in Frankfurt on our way to Tel Aviv. We like it that way because when you land in Frankfurt at 7am, it is really only midnight “body time”. So we have taken a dayroom at a nearby hotel where we can sleep for five hours before flying on. The added benefit is that I will put our winter suitcase into their luggage storage for free and then pick it up when we come back through two weeks later. You can store luggage at the airport as well, but it costs something like 5 Euro per day per bag. I’d rather apply that 60 Euros to a few hours sleep and a hot shower!
Last Minute Decisions
Do I take my computer or just my smartphone? I do have a phone that will work wherever we go, and we use T-Mobile because it is a very common carrier in and around Europe, so taking my phone is a given. You do have to watch how you use it though because it is expensive to do two things with it: make phone calls and use the internet! We use it primarily for unavoidables or emergencies. I don’t answer it if I don’t recognize the person calling. I’m not going to pay 2-3 dollars to hear some pre-recorded telemarketer!
But I do use it to scan my email each day and see which ones need to be addressed quickly! I used to carry my laptop computer for this, but if email were all I needed a computer for, I would leave the computer at home. I don’t like the extra hassle at the airports, the problems with logging in at hotels, nor the weight in my backpack.
BUT, just for you I am taking it this year, so that I can blog more easily! I tried last year using hotel computers, but did you know that many countries have different keyboards—a real pain! And often, at least in the hotels where we stay, there are only one or two computers and they won’t let you tie them up for an hour at a time.
To help avoid lots of computer time though, I have been downloading several apps to my smartphone (Android) especially for this trip. Kayak is a great search engine for travel, so that is now mine! I also downloaded Priceline’s app because I still have to make hotel reservations for the last part of our trip in Europe. I love to get 4-star hotels for 50-75% off!! I’m using Pageonce to track our flight information. With these apps, I don’t have to pull out the computer and try to get online in airports or at poorly wired hotels. I can do most of our travel arrangements with my phone, if need be.
I also bought a Garmin for this trip because we will be driving all over western Europe for the last 15 days. If you rent one from the car rental place, they cost you about 10 Euro or $15/day, so I figured I could buy one and get the European maps for it and pretty much break even. Navigation systems are time and nerve-savers when you are driving in foreign countries—and they all speak English!
Last-minute To Do’s!
Here’s my list for the next few hours:
- Get about $500 cash from the local bank—all in newer $100 bills.
- Pick up the cleaning!
- Leave the car with at least ½ tank of gas.
- Call my Mom again and make sure she has our itinerary
- Update itinerary and distribute it to our families
- Check-in online before we go to the airport
- Email contacts at our first stops and just verify that they will meet us.
- Update our personal finances so that there are no bad surprises about our checking account while we are on the road and they are hard to fix!
That’s it! It’s 7:45 am, time to wake Sherrylee up! Ben will pick us up and take us to the airport in exactly five hours. If there is any time, I may try to go to Kellan’s flag football game!
Let’s have fun on this trip! Pray that we have great conversations about spreading the Word everywhere we go! I’m really excited because we have three firm appointments in Israel and Jordan to talk about LST—and maybe another one!
This is the day the Lord has made! To Him be the glory!
Mark's Blog 
Have a nice trip!