I’m finally here in California! It’s been quite a day. I got up early this morning to have breakfast with Teresa before she had to go to work, and I had to get ready to leave for the airport. In the days leading up to today, I discovered that if you check a bag early you get a discount, and if you also check in online for your flight United has a special line for you to give them your bag (I think they call it the bag drop shortcut - and who doesn’t love a shortcut?), so I did both. The bag drop shortcut is well worth it by the way, it was very quick and painless. The only downside was it involved a LOT of extra walking! Facing into Terminal C at Newark, the bag drop shortcut line is on level 3 all the way to the left, but the security line I had to use was on level 2, all the way to the right, and then my gate was all the way over to the left again, all the way at the end of the concourse. So I definitely got my steps in today!
(That’s actually a big positive for me though, as my work started a fitness challenge for the whole month of May. With this trip, winning the challenge might just be like taking candy from a baby….)
Anyway, once I got through security, which was pretty uneventful, I made my way to the gate. Found a seat, had some (expensive overpriced) food, and hung out waiting to board.
When I checked in online, I prepaid for the onboard WiFi, thinking that I’d be bored and would stream movies or shows to fill the time. I stuffed a USB to USB-C cable in my back pocket, figuring I’d have a USB port at my seat to plug into. I was wrong - no USB ports or screens on the plane of any kind! So, after takeoff I activated my WiFi and figured I’d at least try it out before digging a charging base out of my carry-on bag. Good thing I didn’t waste my time finding a base - the bandwidth was awful, and I couldn’t even START a stream in the Peacock app! (I came prepared for this trip with Peacock, Paramount Plus, Netflix AND Prime Video so I’d have stuff to watch should I find myself with downtime while not riding.) Anyway, at one point in the flight the woman sitting in front of me asked one of the flight attendants for help with the WiFi, and she told her that it’s an older plane, and the WiFi was spotty regardless of where we were or what altitude we were at. I found it to be generally pretty slow, and I noticed that other passengers were having trouble with the in-flight entertainment buffering and being unreliable as well, so I think in the future I may pass on the WiFi since it doesn’t seem to be worth it anyway.
Blog Bookmarked. Looking forward to following your trip.
ReplyDeleteThanks John! I know my last few posts have left something to be desired, but time has been short. I'll try to make up for it, if not over the next few days (shorter rides), on the first rest day - maybe a recap post that day.
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