Travel home

I traveled with a medium large wheeled suitcase, a square duffel and my backpack.  Luggage does get misplaced on these international flights and if I found clothing that would fit in China it would be at the Gap or H&M! So I put two days of clothes in the duffle and carry that onboard as a back-up plan.  Weather this trip was typical Spring weather like Washington DC where nights were real cold and the days were in the 50's.  This required jackets and sweaters.  

Coming home I started the stopwatch on my antique smartphone once I left the hotel.  I walked to the line seven station and transferred to line two where the mag lift station was adjacent to.   I did not see an elevator so I had to drag my luggage up one flight of stairs and navigate multiple doors.  If you are a Shanghai team member and thinking about the Maglev only do it if you can manage your luggage on stairs.  From Airport to Hotel everything is downhill and easy.  Once at the Maglev station I paid my 50 RMB ticket ($8.10 as of May 2013).  Seems there is a 10RMB discount coming from the airport if you show your boarding pass. The train arrived as I was going up the escalator.  The train ride is maybe 20 minutes so the whole trip from hotel to airport is close to 45 minutes; about equal to a taxi ride which costs 100RMB.  Even though the taxi ride never goes above 100KMH and the train sometimes exceeds 300 KMH the taxi is more like an amusement ride.

Shanghai PVG airport is a dud with a poor United lounge and over prices shops.  The time went by fast and before long I was settling into my seat on yet another 777. After dinner was served my plan was to sleep just 4-6 hours and then stay up until my arrival in Orlando to start the process of resetting my internal clock.  When I awoke in the dark cabin and turned on the TV and saw 2.5 hrs left on the flight I realized I slept for more than 8 hours on a 13.5 hour flight.  DANG-IT!  The end of flight snack was served and I watched the Hobbitt instead of getting my work computer out.  Procrastination...

Have I mentioned before my disdain of the US Customs and Border Patrol organization.  Our plane filled their queue line and with only a hand full of agents I moved through the line in 40 minutes for a quick glance and stamp of my passport.  Ridiculous! Next was a customs stop to declare my "flea" market goods then re-united with luggage, rechecked, rescanned and off to Terminal one.   Total time maneuvering through the CBP mumbo-jumbo was over an hour.   

Sally had an emergency visit with a friend so I caught a cab home for $35 USD (9 miles) and stopped my watch on what my China colleagues would say was a good omen.  Lucky double 8 at the end of a 23 hour 11 minute and 11 seconds trip home.  This was 3 hours faster than going over because I had such a long layover in SF.