Plane Dealings
Trip Start
Sep 09, 2008
1
2
23
Trip End
Sep 30, 2008
Las Vegas,
Nevada,
United States
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
This is being written while standing in line waiting for Hawaiian Airlines to open their check-in gates. Our flight from Las Vegas to Honolulu does not depart until 2:30 AM and they will start check-in at midnight. Of course, our flight from Atlanta was annoyingly on time (a few minutes early, in fact) and we arrived here at 9:35...at the fancy, glitzy, hi-tech main terminal at McCarran. Dart and I got directions from an airport employee, who responded to the "where's Hawaiian" with a curled-lip "ohhh...that's in TERMINAL TWO" and a vague set of directions: "walk to the end of this building, go outside and walk about ten minutes." We got outside and noticed a lack of signs and functioning streetlamps. Dubiously, we confirmed that no one would transport us from the main terminal for free and that our destination was, indeed, at the end of a long, dark sidewalk.
So...Terminal 2... is actually the remains of the 1950's McCarran Field, when one-half of Nevada's population lived in Las Vegas - all 100,000 of them. It is also virtually unlabeled with no inter-terminal shuttle service. I think the carpets may have been upgraded - around 1975 or so (Dart thinks 1980-ish). When we arrived, the Hawaiian staff was putting up their signs - magnetic - and their brochure racks. Hey, why pay for what you don't use? I think these guys run two flights a day from here at most...
Well, we're only 20 minutes from check-in. Armed with our $3 vending machine cokes (oh yeah, that's all we get in TERMINAL TWO), we're toughing it out until flight time.
(1:30 AM Las Vegas Time)
Took a "quick" nap...went I fell asleep, there were about ten people in the gate area...opening my eyes again, we look darn near full!
I'll write again from Honolulu - we arrive at 5:30 AM local time (a little before sunrise) - eighteen hours of flying and waiting since leaving Tampa.
Missing everyone, but really excited about getting there!!
